Chapter 14: Psychological Disorders

Psychopathology

•Problematic patterns of thought, feeling, or behavior that disrupt an individual’s life

•What “society” find atypical

•Different across cultures

Psychopathology

•Every culture has a concept of “madness”

•Changes over time

–Zhun/twa of Zambia: killing a twin is common practice

–India: widows often burn themselves on their deceased husband’s funeral pyre

•Within Cultures:

•Amish consider someone who races a horse too hard or buys or consumes in excess to have an emotional disorder

Cultural Construction?

•Thomas Szasz proposed mental illness was a myth to make others conform to society’s standards of normality

•Labeling Theory

–diagnosis is simply a way of labeling individuals whom society considers deviant

•Rosenhan (1973)

•demonstrated that psychiatric illness is in the eye of the beholder.

•critics argue behavior is only meaningful when it is understood in context

•Labeling Theory fell from grace when empirical investigations failed to support it

•Many disorders occur cross-culturally

•Biological basis for certain mental illness

Descriptive Approach to Diagnosis

•Diagnostic & Statistical Manual-IV

•Publication of the American Psychiatric Association that classifies over 230 psychological disorders into 16 categories

•Most widely used classification of psychological disorders

•Mental disorders classified in terms of clinical syndromes

•Depressive Syndrome:loss of interest in pleasurable activities, insomnia, loss of appetite, poor concentration, decreased self-esteem

•Recipe of mental disorders

•Psychological disorders tend to fall into discrete categories like medical disorders.

Mood Disorders

•Intense and prolonged mood shifts

•DEPRESSION1. Experience truly profoundunhappiness2. Lost interest in life’s usual pleasures3. Experience major loss of energy

•Most Frequent

•Bipolar Disorder: depression/mania

•Manic Episodes:

–people require less sleep

–feel a constant need to talk

–a grandiose sense of self

–develop delusions and hallucinations

Anxiety Disorders

•Increased arousal accompanied by generalized feelings of fear or apprehension

–Panic Attack Disorder: unbearable intense anxiety over a short period

•Specific situations

•Phobias: persistent irrational fear

•Claustrophobiaclosed spaces

•Acrophobiaheight

•Arachnophobiaspiders

•Ophidiophobiaspiders

•Brontophobiastorms

•Nyctophobiadarkness

•Cynophobiadogs

•Allurophobiacats

•Mysophobiadirt

•Thanatophobiadeath

•Panophobiaeverything

•Scopophobiabeing stared at

•AthruaphobiaFear of Dr. Whatley’s Last Exam!!

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

•An anxiety disorder in which a person feels driven to think disturbing thoughts (obsessions) and/or to perform senseless rituals (compulsions)

Psychosomatic vs. Somatoform

•psychosomatic: Disorders in which there is REAL physical illness that is largely caused by psychological factors such as stress and anxiety

•somatoform: Disorders in which there is an APPARENT physical illness for which there is no organic basis

Somatoform Disorders

•Hypochondriasis: Anxiety converted into chronic preoccupations with your health

•Conversion Disorder: Individuals experience real motor or sensory symptoms for which there is no organic cause

Dissociative Disorders

•Lengthy losses of memory

•Dissociative amnesia: no organic cause

•Localized Amnesia: all events

•Selective Amnesia: some events

•Generalized Amnesia: prior to specific date

•Dissociative Fugue: Person wanders off, adopts a new identity, and is unable to recall their own past

Personality Disorders

•SCHIZOID PERSONALITY

•A personality disorder in which a person is withdrawn and lacks feelings for others

•The classic “loner”

•PARANOID PERSONALITY

•Personality disorder in which the person is inappropriately suspicious and mistrustful of others

•Paranoid personality disorder is NOT the same as paranoid schizophrenia

•NARCISSISTIC PERSONALITY

•Personality disorder in which the person has an exaggerated sense of self-importance and needs constant admiration

•ANTISOCIAL PERSONALITY

•Personality disorder that involves a pattern of violent, criminal, or unethical and exploitative behavior and an inability to feel affection for others

Gender Differences

•Gender differences tend to be found for those disorders without a strong biological component

•marital status and incidence of psychological disorders: divorced/separated men married women married men

Sexual Disorders

•sexual dysfunctions

•paraphilias

•gender-identity disorders

Sexual Dysfunctions

  • A loss or impairment of the ordinary physical responses of sexual function
  • erectile disorder: The inability of a man to achieve or maintain an erection
  • female sexual arousal disorder: The inability of a woman to become sexually aroused or to reach orgasm
  • sexual desire disorders: Disorders in which the person lacks sexual interest or has an active distaste for sex
  • sexual arousal disorder: Inability to achieve or sustain arousal until the end of intercourse in a person who is capable of experiencing sexual desire
  • orgasmic disorders: Inability to reach orgasm in a person able to experience sexual desire and maintain arousal
  • premature ejaculation: In ability of a man to inhibit orgasm as long as desired
  • vaginismus: Involuntary muscle spasms in the outer part of the vagina that make intercourse impossible

Paraphilias

  • Sexual disorders in which unconventional objects or situations cause sexual arousal
  • fetishism: A paraphilia in which a nonhuman object is the preferred or exclusive method of achieving sexual excitement
  • voyeurism: Desire to watch others having sexual relations or to spy on nude people
  • exhibitionism: Compulsion to expose one’s genitals in public to achieve sexual arousal
  • frotteurism: Compulsion to achieve sexual arousal by touching or rubbing against a nonconsenting person in public situations
  • transvestic fetishism: Wearing the clothes of the opposite sex to achieve sexual gratification
  • sexual sadism: Obtaining sexual gratification from humiliating or physically harming a sex partner
  • sexual masochism: Inability to enjoy sex without accompanying emotional or physical pain
  • pedophilia: Desire to have sexual relations with children as the preferred or exclusive method of achieving sexual excitement