Psychological Disorders

unit 14
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Introduction Psychological Disorders
Anxiety Disorders
Mood Disorders
Personality Disorders
Dissociative Disorders
Somotoform Disorders
Psychotic Disorders
 Introduction to
Psychological Disorders
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A harmful dysfunction in which behavior is judged
to be

Atypical

Disturbing

Maladaptive

and Unjustifiable
Phobias
Causes
 Historical Perspective

Perceived Causes
Movements of the sun or moon.
Full moon == lunacy
Evil spirits
Ancient Treatments
Exorcism, caged like animals, beaten, burned,
castrated, mutilated, blood replaced with
animal’s blood.
 Biological Perspective

“The Medical Model”

Mental disorders as physical
Brain abnormalities
Chemical imbalances
Birth difficulties
High heritability
 Psychodynamic perspective

Sigmund Freud
Unconscious conflicts and drives
Early childhood trauma
Therapy helps person become aware of underlying
conflicts
 Cognitive Perspective

Learned maladaptive thought patterns cause

mental disorders
 Behavioral Perspective

Learned maladaptive behaviors cause mental

disorders
 Socio-Cultural Perspective

Larger culture important to development of

mental disorders

Supporting evidence from “culture-bound

syndromes”

Anorexia and Bulimia in North America and

Western Europe
BioPsychoSocial Model

Biological

Psychological Sociological
Multiple
Causation Predisposing

Precipitating Maintaining
 DSM

Neurotic disorders
Disorders that are distressing, but still allow one
to function in society
Psychotic disorders
A person loses contact with reality, experiencing
irrational ideas and distorted perceptions
Rates of Psychological Disorders

2.1 million inpatient admissions to US hospitals

and psychiatric units.

Another 2.4 million have sought outpatient care.

15% of Americans are judged by health care

professionals as needing some psychiatric help in
the course of a year.
No known culture is free of schizophrenia and
depression.

WHO reports that 400 million worldwide suffer

from a psychological disorder.

Incidence of serious psychological disorders is

doubly high among those below the poverty line.
75% of people who will ever have a psychological
disorder experience the first symptoms by age 24.

Antisocial personality disorder and phobias

appear by a median age of 8 and 10.
Anxiety Disorders
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 Generalized Anxiety Disorder

A person is continually tense, apprehensive, and in a

state of autonomic nervous system arousal
anxiety
 Panic Disorder

Anxiety disorder marked by minutes-long episode of

intense dread in which a person experiences terror
and accompanying chest pain, choking, or other
frightening sensations
 Phobias

A persistent, irrational fear and avoidance of a

specific object or situation.
phobias
 100
Percentage 90
of people 80
surveyed 70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Snakes Being Mice Flying Being Spiders Thunder Dogs Driving Being Cats
Being
in high, on an closed in, and and a car In a
alone
exposed airplane in a insects lightning crowd
In a house
places small of people
at night
place

Afraid of it Bothers slightly Not at all afraid of it

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
Characterized by unwanted repetitive thoughts
(obsessions) and/or actions (compulsions)
Obsessions
Concern with dirt, germs of toxins - 40%

Something terrible happening (fire, death, etc) – 24%

Symmetry, order, or exactness – 85%

Compulsions
Excessive hand washing/ cleaning – 85%

Repeating rituals – 51%

Checking doors, locks, etc – 46%

Explaining Anxiety
Disorders
 Cognitive Perspective

Fear conditioning

Stimulus generalization

Reinforcement

Observational learning
 Biological Perspective

Evolution/ Natural selection

Genes or temperament

Physiology

anterior cingular cortex

amygdala
 Anxiety Disorders

Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Panic Disorder
Phobias
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
 Dissociative and
Personality Disorders

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 Personality Disorders

Disorders characterized by inflexible and enduring

behavior patterns that impair social functioning.
Histrionic Personality Disorder
Narcissistic Personality Disorder
Borderline Personality Disorder
Antisocial Personality Disorder
Histrionic Personality Disorder

characterized by a pattern of excessive

emotionality and attention-seeking, including an
excessive need for approval and inappropriate
seductiveness, usually beginning in early
adulthood.
Narcissistic Personality Disorders

"a pervasive pattern of grandiosity, need for

admiration, and a lack of empathy."
Borderline Personality Disorders

"a pervasive pattern of instability of

interpersonal relationships, self-image and
affects, as well as marked impulsivity, beginning
by early adulthood and present in a variety of
contexts."
Anti-Social Personality Disorders

"The essential feature for the diagnosis is a

pervasive pattern of disregard for, and violation
of, the rights of others that begins in childhood
or early adolescence and continues into
adulthood."
Antisocial Personality Disorder
 Dissociative Disorders
Dissociative Amnesia
Loss of memory.
Selective memory loss often brought on by
extreme stress
Dissociative Fugue
Flight from one’s home & identity accompanies
amnesia
Skeptics wonder if it’s strategic
Dissociative Disorder
Dissociative Disorder
Dissociative Identity Disorder

Person exhibits two or more distinct and

alternating personalities (dba. Multiple-Personality
Disorder)
Supporting evidence
Distinct brain & body states, handedness changes, different vision

Contrary evidence
Increasing diagnoses, increasing personalities
 Somotoform Disorders

Physical disorders which have psychological causes.

Hypochondria

Conversion Reactions
Mood Disorders

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Major Depressive Disorder

A person, for no apparent reason, experiences two or

more weeks of depressed moods, feelings of
worthlessness, and diminished interest or pleasure in
most activities
Major Depressive Disorder is the leading cause of
disability in the US for ages 15–44

It affects approximately 14.8 million American adults,

or about 6.7% age 18 and older in a given year

Median age at onset is 32

More prevalent in women than in men

 More than 32,000 suicides a year;
425,000 self-inflicted injuries per year
40-50% of college students have thought about
suicide. 15% have attempted suicide.
Suicide

1 out of 80 college students is the survivor of a

loved one’s suicide.
78% of all suicides are by men
Firearms are most common for men; poison for
women
17% of high school students have thought about
suicide
2nd leading cause of death for 25-34 year-olds;
3rd leading cause of death for 15-24 year-olds
 Common Characteristics

1. Unendurable 6. Constrictions of
psychological pain options
2. Frustrated 7. Ambivalence
psychological need
8. Communication of
3. The search for a intent (80%)
solution
9. Departure
4. Helplessness and
10. Lifelong coping
Hopelessness
patterns
5. An attempt to end
consciousness
 Warning Signs of Suicide
Talking about suicide Visiting or calling
Statements about people that one cares
hopelessness, about but hasn’t
helplessness, or communicated with
worthlessness recently
Preoccupation with Making
death arrangements; setting
one’s affairs in order
Suddenly happier,
calmer Giving things away
Loss of interest in
things one cares about
 Bipolar Disorder
Major depression is sometimes followed by a manic
episode: hyperactive, wildly optimistic state
dba. Manic Depressive

Depressed state Manic state Depressed state

 Explaining Mood Disorders
Biological Perspective Social-Cognitive
Perspective
Genetic influences
Negative thoughts feed
50% chance twin will negative moods
have similar mood
disorder Negative mood feeds
negative thoughts
The Brain
High norepinephrine
during manic state; low
norepinephrine during
depression

Low serotonin during

depression

Smaller frontal lobes in

depressed people
Schizophrenia

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 Psychotic Disorders
Schizophrenia
Symptoms
Disorganized thinking
Disturbed perceptions
Inappropriate emotions and actions
Types
Positive & Negative
Chronic & Acute
Compare to Infantile Autism
Social isolation
Stereotyped behaviors
Resistance to any change
Abnormal responses to sensory stimuli
Insensitivity to pain
Inappropriate emotional expression
Disturbances of movement
Poor development of speech
Specific, limited intellectual problems
 Subtypes of Schizophrenia
Preoccupation with delusions or
Paranoid
hallucinations
Disorganized speech of behavior, a
Disorganized
flat or inappropriate affect
Immobility (or purposeless
movement), extreme negativism,
Catatonic
and/or parrotlike repeating of
another’s speech or movements
Undifferentiated or
residual
 Causes

Brain abnormalities
Dopamine overactivity
More receptors; extra dopamine can induce
(ie cocaine)
Brain anatomy
Low frontal lobe activity
Spaces in brain filled with fluid
Smaller than average thalamus
 Causes

Genetic factors
1 in 100 chance of developing schizophrenia.
1 in 10 if parent or sibling developed.
1 in 2 if identical twin develops it.