ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
CHAPTER 1: ABNORMAL BEHAVIOR IN
HISTORY CONTEXT
Abnormality – “abnormal” refers to being
above/below the norm
- In abnormal psychology, if behavior
creates problem and becomes disruptive to
himself or other, then this would be
considered abnormal
Psychopathology – study of mental disorders;
focusing on the disorders
- Theoretical basis
- Etiology (nature and cause)
- Symptomatology (manifestations of the
symptoms)
- Diagnosis
- Treatment
Psychological Disorder – a psychological
dysfunction within an individual associated with
distress/impairment in functioning and a response
that is not typical or culturally expected
Criteria defining a psychological disorder:
 Dysfunction
 Distress
 Deviant
 Dangerous
Abnormal Behavior – a psychological
dysfunction within an individual that is associated
with distress/impairment in functioning and a
response that is not typical/culturally expected
1) Psychological Dysfunction – a
breakdown in cognitive, emotional, or
behavioral functioning
- Ex: experience severe fear all evening
when on a date or your emotions are not
functioning properly
2) Distress/Impairment – criterion is
satisfied if the individual is extremely
upset
- Criterion itself does not define
problematic abnormal behavior. It is quite
normal to be distressed
- Some disorders, by definition, suffering
and distress are absent
- One of the major difficulties with this
problem is that some people enjoy the
manic state so much they are reluctant to
begin treatment or stay long in treatment.
Thus, defining psychological disorder by
distress alone doesn’t work, although
concepts of distress contribute to a good
definition
- Most psychological disorders are simply
extreme expressions of otherwise normal
emotions, behaviors, and cognitive
processes
3) Atypical/Not Culturally Expected –
important but also insufficient to
determine if a disorder is present by itself
- Ex: talented/eccentric – people that are
far from the average behavior, but few
would be considered disorder (such as
Lady Gaga wearing meat clothing)
- The more productive you are in the eyes
of society; the more eccentricities society
will tolerate. Therefore, “deviating from
the average” doesn’t work well as a
definition for problematic abnormal
behavior
- View that your behavior is disordered if
you are violating social norms, even if a
number of people are sympathetic to your
point of view. This definition is useful in
considering important cultural differences
in psychological disorders
- Harmful dysfunction – behavior is out of
individual’s control
Accepted Definition
Psychological Disorder (DSM-5) – behavioral,
psychological, or biological dysfunctions that are
unexpected in their cultural context and
associated with present distress and impairment
in functioning, or increased risk of suffering,
death, pain, or impairment
- Consider how the apparent
disease/disorder matches a “typical”
profile disorder
- Prototype – patient may have only had
some features/symptoms of the disorder (a
minimum number) and still meet the
criteria for the disorder because his/her
symptoms is close to the prototype
Science of Psychopathology
Psychopathology – scientific study of
psychological disorder
- Counseling psychologist – study and
treat adjustment and vocational issues
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encountered by relatively healthy
individuals
- Clinical psychologist – concentrate more
on sever psychological disorders
- Experimental and social psychologists –
concentrate on investigating the basic
determinants of behaviors but do not
assess or treat psychological disorders
- Psychiatrists – investigate the nature and
cause of psychological disorders, often
from a biological point of view; make
diagnoses; and offer treatments. They
emphasize drugs/other biological
treatments, although most use
psychosocial treatment
- Psychiatric Social Workers – develop
expertise in collecting information
relevant to the social and family situation
of the individual with psychological
disorder; concentrating on family
problems
- Psychiatric Nurses – specialize in the
care and treatment of patients with
psychological disorders
- Marriage and Family Therapists and
Mental Health Counselors – provide
clinical services by hospitals/clinics,
usually under the supervision of a
doctoral-level clinician
Scientist-Practitioner
- Mental health professionals take a
scientific approach to their clinical work
- They may function as scientist-
practitioners in three ways:
o They may keep up with the latest
scientific developments in their
field and therefore use the most
current diagnostic and treatment
procedures. They are consumers of
the science of psychopathology to
the advantage of their patients
o Scientist-practitioners evaluate
their own assessments/treatment
procedures to see whether they
work. They must demonstrate
clearly whether their treatments
are effective or not
o They might conduct research,
often in clinics and hospitals, that
produces new information about
disorders or their treatment
- Data flow from research that attempts
three basic things:
o To describe psychological
disorders
o To determine their causes
o To treat them
Clinical Description
Presenting problem – patient “presents” with a
specific problem
Presents – traditional shorthand ways of
indicating why the person came to the clinic
Clinical description – represents the unique
combination of behaviors, thoughts, and feelings
that make up a specific disorder
Clinical – refers both the types of problems or
disorders that you would find in a clinic/hospital
and to the activities connected with assessment
and treatment
- One important function of the clinical
description is to specify what makes the
disorder different from normal behavior or
from other disorders. Statistical data may
also be relevant
- Prevalence of the disorder (how many
people in the population as a whole has a
disorder?)
- Incidence of the disorder (how many new
cases occur during a given period, such as
a year)
Course – most disorders follow a somewhat
different pattern
- Chronic course – they tend to last a long
time, sometimes a lifetime
- Episodic course – the individual is likely
to recover within a few months only to
suffer a recurrence of the disorder at a
later time. This may repeat through a
person’s life
- Time-limited course – disorder will
improve without treatment in a relatively
short period with little or no risk of
recurrence
Differences in the course of disorders are
differences in onset
- Acute onset – they begin suddenly
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- Insidious onset – others develop
gradually over an extended period
- It is important to know the typical course
of a disorder so that we can know what to
expect in the future and how best to deal
with the problem. This is an important of
the clinical description
Prognosis – anticipated course of a disorder. We
may say, “the prognosis is good,” meaning the
individual will probably recover, or “the
prognosis is guarded,” meaning the probable
outcome doesn’t look good
- The patients age may be an important part
of the clinical description (specific
psychological disorder in childhood may
present differently from the same disorder
in adulthood/old age)
- Children are often misdiagnosed and
treated for a medical disorder
Developmental psychology – study in behavior
Developmental psychopathology – study of
changes in abnormal behavior
Life-span developmental psychopathology –
study of abnormal behavior across life span
Causation, Treatment and Etiology Outcomes
Etiology – the study of origins, has to do with
why a disorder begins (what causes it) and
includes biological, psychological, and social
dimensions
- Treatment is also, often important to the
study of psychological disorders. If a new
drug/psychosocial treatment is successful
in treating a disorder, it may give us some
hints about the nature of the disorder and
its causes
- Psychopathology is rarely simple because
the effect does not necessarily imply the
cause
Historical Conceptions of Abnormal Behavior
- Purpose of the models is to explain why
someone is “acting like that”
1) SUPERNATURAL TRADITION
Demons and Witches (14th – 15th century)
- People increasingly turned to magic and
sorcery to solve their problems
- The bizarre behavior of people afflicted
with psychological disorders was seen as
the work of the devil and witches
- Individuals possessed by evil spirits were
probably responsible for any misfortune
experienced by people in the local
community, which inspired drastic action
against possessed
- Treatment included exorcism, in which
various religious rituals were performed in
an effort to rid the victim of evil spirits
- Evil continued to be blamed for
unexplainable behavior
Stress and Melancholy
- Reflected the enlightened view that
insanity was a natural phenomenon,
caused by mental or emotional stress, and
that it was curable
- Mental depression and anxiety were
recognized as illnesses, although
symptoms such as despair and lethargy
were often identified by the church with
the sin of acedia/sloth
- Common treatments were rest, sleep, and
a healthy and happy environment + baths,
ointments and various potions
- (14th – 15th centuries) people with physical
deformities/disabilities, were often moved
from house to house in medieval villages
as neighbors took turns in caring them
- Medieval practice of keeping people who
have psychological disturbances in their
own community is beneficial
- Nicholas Oresme – suggested that the
disease of melancholy (depression) was
the source of some bizarre behavior,
rather than demons
Treatment and Possession
- The sufferer is largely responsible for the
disorder, which might well be a
punishment for evil deeds
- Acquired immune deficiency syndrome
(AIDS) epidemic was associated with a
similar belief among some people
- Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) –
many people believed it was a divine
punishment for what they considered
immoral behavior
- Possession is not always connected with
sin but may be seen as involuntary and the
possessed individual is blameless
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- If exorcism failed, authorities take
necessary steps to make the body
unhabitable by evil spirits through beating
and other forms of torture
- Strangely the torture approach sometimes
worked; the most disturbed, oddly
behaving individuals would suddenly
come to their senses and experience relief
from their symptoms
- Therapeutic shock treatment was
developed (dunking in ice-cold water)
Mass Hysteria
- Characterized by large-scale outbreaks of
bizarre behavior
- Emotion contagion – if someone is
sad/frightened, you will also feel the same
way as them. When this situation
escalates, whole community is affected.
People are also suggestible when they are
in a state of high emotion
- Mob psychology
- Emotion contagion occurring across social
networks, raising the possibility that
episodes of mass hysteria may increase
Moon and Stars
Paracelsus – suggests that movements of the
moon and stars had profound effects on people’s
psychological functioning; gravitational effects of
the moon on bodily fluids might be possible
cause of mental disorders
- Lunatic – derived from “luna” which is
moon
- No scientific/serious evidence
- This belief is most noticeable today in
followers of astrology, who hold that their
behavior and the events in their lives can
be predicted by their day-to-day
relationship to the position of the planets
2) BIOLOGICAL TRADITION
Hippocrates and Galen
- Hippocrates – father of modern Western
medicine; he suggested that psychological
disorders might also be caused by brain
pathology/head trauma and could be
influenced by heredity (genetics)
- He considered the brain to be the seat of
wisdom, consciousness, intelligence, and
emotion. Disorders involving these
functions would logically be located in the
brain. He also recognized the importance
of psychological and interpersonal
contributions of psychopathology
- Galen – adopted the ideas of Hippocrates
and further developed, creating a powerful
and influential school of thought within
the biological tradition
Humoral theory
- 1st example of associating disorders with a
“chemical imbalance”
- Hippocratic-Galenic approach assuming
the normal brain functioning was related
to four bodily fluids/humors:
o Blood – came from the heart
o Black bile – from spleen
o Yellow bile – from the liver
o Phlegm – from the brain
- Physicians believed that disease resulted
from too much/too little of one of the
humors; ex:
o Melancholer means “black bile” –
derivative from melancholy to
refer aspects of depression
- Four humors are related to Greeks’
conception of the four basic qualities:
o Heat
o Dryness
o Moisture
o Cold
- Sometimes connected to personality traits
o Sanguine – “red, like blood”;
ruddy in complexion, presumably
from copious blood flowing
through the body, and cheerful
optimistic, although insomnia and
delirium were thought to be caused
by excessive blood in the brain
o Melancholic – depressive
(depression was thought to be
caused by black bile flooding in
the brain)
o Phlegmatic – personality (from
the humor phlegm) indicates
apathy and sluggishness but can
also mean being calm under stress
o Choleric – from yellow bile, is hot
tempered
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- Excess of one or more humors were
treated by regulating the environment to
increase/decrease heat, dryness,
moisture/cold, depending on which humor
was out of balance
- Bleeding/bloodletting – carefully
measured amount of blood was removed
from the body, often with leeches. Other
was induce vomiting (eating tobacco and
a half-boiled cabbage to induce vomiting)
- Chinese focused on the movement of air/
“wind” throughout the body
o Unexplained mental disorders
were caused by blockages of
wind/the presence of the cold, dark
wind (yin) as opposed to warm,
life-sustaining wind (yang)
o Treatment involved restoring
proper flow of wind through
various methods, including
acupuncture
- Hysteria – somatic symptom disorder
(Hippocrates) – physical symptoms
appear to be the result of a medical
problem for which no physical cause can
be found, such as paralysis and some kind
of blindness
19th Century – discovery of the nature and
cause of syphilis and strong support form
John P. Grey
Syphilis – sexually transmitted disease caused
by a bacterial organism entering the brain,
include believing everyone is plotting against
you (delusion of persecution) or that you are
God (delusion of grandeur)
- Although these symptoms are similar to
those of psychosis – psychological
disorders characterized in part by beliefs
that are not based on reality (delusions),
perceptions that are not based on reality
(hallucinations)
- The condition was designated a disease,
general paresis, because it had consistent
symptoms (presentation) and a consistent
course that resulted in death
- Louis Pasteur – germ theory of disease,
facilitated the identification of the specific
bacterial microorganism that caused
syphilis
- Penicillin cures syphilis
John P. Grey – champion of the biological
tradition in the US and was the most influential
American psychiatrist of the time
- His position was that the cause of insanity
was always physical. Therefore, the
mentally ill patient should be treated as
physically ill
- He also invented the rotary fan to ventilate
the hospital
The Developmental of Biological Treatments
- 1930s – physical interventions of electric
shock and brain surgery were often used.
Their effects of new drugs, were
discovered quite by accident
o Insulin – stimulate appetite and
also seemed to calm the patients
down; higher dosage resulted in
convulsion that leads to temporary
comatose
o Insulin shock therapy – was also
abandoned because it was too
dangerous, often resulted to
prolonged coma and even death
- 1970s – mild and modest electric shock to
the head produced a brief convulsion and
memory loss (amnesia) but otherwise did
a little harm
o Electroconvulsive therapy
- 1950s – first effective drugs for severe
psychotic disorders were developed in a
systematic way
o Opium (derived from poppies) –
used as sedatives along with other
herbs and folk remedies
o Rauwolfia serpentine (reserpine)
and neuroleptics (major
tranquilizers) – for the first time
hallucinatory and delusional
thought processes could be
diminished in some patients; these
drugs also controlled agitation and
aggressiveness
o Benzodiazepines (minor
tranquilizers) – reduce anxiety
o Benzodiazepines (valium and
Librium) – most widely prescribed
drugs in the world
o Bromides – class of sedating
drugs, they were reported as being
effective for many serious
psychological and emotional
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symptoms (eventually disappeared
due to its effectivity being modest)
- Neuroleptics have also been used less
since it has many side effects such as
chronic tremors and shaking,
hallucinations, delusions, and agitation
Consequences of the Biological Tradition
- Grey and his colleagues reduced/eliminate
interest in treating mental patients,
because they thought that mental disorders
were the result of some as-yet-
undiscovered brain pathology and were
therefore incurable. The only available
course of action was to hospitalize these
patients
- Emil Kraepelin – one of the founding
fathers of modern psychiatry. He was
extremely influential in advocating the
major ideas of the biological tradition, but
he was little involved in treatment
- He was one of the first to distinguish
among various psychological disorders,
seeing that each may have a different age
of onset and time course, with different
clusters of presenting symptoms and
different cause
- Treatment was based on humane
principles
3) PSYCHOLOGICAL TRADITION
Plato – thought that the two causes of
maladaptive behavior were the social and cultural
influences in one’s life and the learning that took
place in that environment
- The best treatment was to reeducate the
individual through rational discussion so
that the power of reason would
predominate
- Psychosocial treatment approaches to the
causation of psychopathology, which
focus not only on psychological factors
but also on social and cultural ones
Aristotle – emphasized the influence of social
environment and early learning on later
psychopathology
Moral Therapy
Moral – referred more to
emotional/psychological factors rather than to a
code of conduct
- Its basic tenets include treating
institutionalized patients as normally as
possible in a setting that encouraged and
reinforced normal social interaction thus
providing them with many opportunities
for appropriate social and interpersonal
contact
- Relationships were carefully nurtured
- Individual attention clearly emphasized
positive consequences for appropriate
interactions and behaviors
Asylum Reform and the Decline of Moral
Therapy
- Human treatment declined because of a
convergence of factors (mid-19th century):
o It was widely recognized that
moral therapy worked best when
the number of patients in an
institution was 200 or fewer,
allowing for a great deal of
individual attention
o Has an unlikely source. The great
crusader Dorothea Dix
campaigned endlessly for reform
in the treatment of insanity (her
work became known as the mental
hygiene movement)
o Through her efforts, humane
treatment became more widely
available in the US institutions –
she was acknowledged as a hero in
the 19th century
- Increase in patients: this led to a rapid
transition from moral therapy to custodial
care because hospitals were inadequately
staffed
- Dix reformed asylums and single-
handedly inspired the construction of
numerous new institutions here and
abroad
- 19th century – final blow to the practice of
moral therapy was the decision, that
mental illness was caused by brain
pathology and was therefore incurable
- 20th century
o Psychoanalysis – elaborate theory
of the structure of the mind and the
role of unconscious processes in
determining behavior
o Behaviorism – associated with
John B. Watson, Ivan Pavlov and
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B.F Skinner, which focuses on
how learning and adaptation affect
the development of
psychopathology
Psychoanalytic Theory
Franz Anton Mesmer – unconscious and to release the accompanying
(hypnotized/mesmerized by someone) he
suggested that the problem of his patients was
caused by an undetectable fluid found in all living
organisms called “animal magnetism” which
could become blocked
- Regarded as father of hypnosis, a state
which extremely suggestible subjects
appear to be in trance
Benjamin Franklin – put animal magnetism to
test; patients receive either magnetized water/non
magnetized water with strong suggestions that
they would get better
- Neither the patient nor the therapist knew
which water was has magnetism which
makes it a double-blind experiment
- Animal magnetism was only a strong
suggestion
Jean-Martin Charcot – demonstrated that some
techniques of mesmerism were effective with a
number of psychological disorders, and he did
much to legitimize the fledging practice of
hypnosis (hysteria)
Josef Breuer – experimented with a somewhat
different hypnotic procedure
- While patients are in highly suggestible
state of hypnosis, Breuer asked his
patients to describe their problems,
conflicts, and fears in as much detail as
they could
- Observed important phenomenon during
the process:
o Patients often became extremely
emotional as they talked and felt
quite relieved and improved after
emerging from the hypnotic state
o Seldom would they have gained an
understanding of the relationship
between the emotional problems
and their psychological disorder
o Material seemed to be beyond the
awareness of the patient
- Breuer and Freud had discovered the
unconscious mind and its apparent
influence on the production of
psychological disorders
Catharsis – therapeutic to recall and relieve
emotional trauma that has been made
tension; release of emotional material
- Fuller understanding of the relationship
between current emotions and earlier
events is referred to as insight
- Freud and Breuer’s theories were based
on case observations, some of which were
made in a systematic way
- Breuer dealt with one symptom at a time
through hypnosis and subsequent “talking
through,” tracing each symptom to its
hypothetical causation in circumstances
- The process of treating one behavior at a
time fulfills a basic requirement for
drawing scientific conclusions about the
effects of treatment in an individual case
study
- Freud’s basic principles of mental
functioning that he originally proposed
remained constant through his writings
and are still applied by psychoanalysts
today
Three major facets of psychoanalytic theory:
1) Structure of the mind and the distinct
functions of personality that sometimes
clash with another
2) Defense mechanisms with which the mind
defends itself from these clashes/conflicts
3) Stages of early psychosexual development
that provides grist for the mill of our inner
conflicts
The Structure of the Mind
1) Id (pleasure principle)
- Source of our strong sexual and
aggressive feelings or energies
- Libido – energy/drive within the id
- Thanatos – death instinct
- Two basic drives, toward life and
fulfillment on the one hand and death and
destruction on the other, are continually in
opposition
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- Overriding goal of maximizing pleasure
and eliminating any associated
tension/conflicts
- Goal of pleasure, which is prominent in
childhood, often conflicts with social rules
and regulations
- Primary process – this type of thinking is
emotional, irrational, illogical, filled with
fantasies, and preoccupied with sex,
aggression, selfishness, and envy
2) Ego (reality principle)
- We must find ways to meet our basic
needs without offending everyone around
us
- Cognitive operations/thinking styles of the
ego are characterized by logic and reason
and are referred to as the secondary
process, as opposed to the primary
process
- Role: mediate conflict between the id and
the superego, juggling their demands with
the realities of the world
- Executive/manager of our minds
- Intrapsychic conflicts – conflicts within
the mind, if the id and superego is strong
3) Superego
- Counteract the potentially dangerous
aggressive and sexual drives of the id, the
basis for conflict is readily apparent
Freud conceptualized the mental structures
described in this section to explain unconscious
processes. He believed that the id and the
superego are almost entirely unconscious.
Defense Mechanisms
- Conflicts produce anxiety that threatens to
overwhelm the ego
- Unconscious protective processes that
keep primitive emotions associated with
conflicts in check so that the ego can
continue its coordinating function
- Anna Freud further conceptualized it
- They are sometimes adaptive and
maladaptive
1) Denial – refuses to acknowledge some
aspects of objective reality/subjective
experience that is apparent to others
2) Displacement – transfers a feeling about,
or a response to, an object that causes
discomfort onto another, usually less
threatening, object or person
o Ego adaptively decides that
expressing primitive anger to
someone
3) Projection – falsely attributes own
unacceptable feelings, impulses, or
thoughts to another individual/object
4) Rationalization – conceals the true
motivations for actions, thoughts/feelings
through elaborate reassuring/self-serving
but incorrect explanations
5) Reaction formation – substitutes
behavior, thoughts/feelings that are the
direct opposite of unacceptable ones
6) Sublimation – directs potentially
maladaptive feelings/impulses into
socially acceptable behavior
o More constructive outlet
Phobic and obsessive symptoms are especially
common self-defeating defensive reactions that
reflect an inadequate attempt to deal with an
internally dangerous situation.
- Phobic symptoms typically incorporate
elements of danger
- Defense mechanisms may be of potential
import in the study of psychopathology
- Coping styles – contemporary
terminology of defense mechanisms
Psychosexual Stages of Development
- Have a profound and lasting impact
- Freud as one of the first to take a
developmental perspective on the study
abnormal behavior
- Oral, anal, phallic, latency and genital
period – represents distinctive patterns of
gratifying our basic needs and satisfying
our drive for physical pleasure
- If we did not receive appropriate
gratification during a specific stage/if a
specific stage left a particularly strong
impression (fixation), an individual’s
personality would reflect throughout adult
life
o Adult personality characteristic
(oral) – dependency, passivity,
rebellious and cynicism
- Early genital stimulation (phallic stage)
o Oedipus complex
o Electra complex
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o Castration anxiety
o Penis envy – conflict is resolved
when females develop healthy
heterosexual relationships and
look forward to having a baby,
which he viewed as healthy
substitute for having a penis
Neuroses – disorders of the nervous system
Later Developments in Psychoanalytic
Thought
Ana Freud – concentrated on the defensive
reactions of the ego determine our behavior
- Ego psychology
- Individual slowly accumulates
adaptational capacities, skill in reality
testing, and defenses
- Abnormal behavior develops when the
ego is deficient in regulating such
functions as delaying and controlling
impulses/in marshaling appropriate
normal defenses to strong internal
conflicts
Heinz Kohut – focused on the theory of the
formation of self-concept and the crucial
attributes of the self that allow an individual to
progress toward health/conversely, to develop
neurosis
- Psychoanalytic approach in known as self-
psychology
Object relation – the study how children
incorporate the images, memories and sometimes
the values of a person who was important to them
and to whom they are (or are) emotionally
attached to
- Object – refers to the important people
- Introjection – process of incorporation
- Introjected objects can become an
integrated part of the ego/may assume
conflicting roles in determining the
identity/self
- In this theory, you tend to see the world
through the eyes of the person
incorporated into your self
- It focuses on how these disparate images
come together to make up a person’s
identity and on the conflicts that may
emerge
Carl Jung and Alfred Adler – rejected Freud’s
ideas and form their own school of thought
- Jung introduced collective unconscious –
wisdom accumulated by society and
culture that is stored deep in individual
memories and passed down from
generation to generation
o He also suggested the spiritual and
religious drives are as much as a
part of human nature as are sexual
drives
o Continues to draw attention to
mystics
- Emphasized the importance of enduring
personality traits such as introversion
(shy and withdrawn) and extroversion
(tendency to be friendly and outgoing)
- Adler – created the term inferiority
complex
- Both believed the basic quality of human
nature is positive and that there is a strong
drive toward self- actualization (realizing
one’s own potential)
- They also believed that by removing
barriers to both internal and external
growth the individual would improve and
flourish
Others took psychoanalytical theorizing in
different directions, emphasizing development
over the life span and the influence of culture and
society on personality.
Erik Erikson – greatest contribution was his
theory of development across the life span, in
which he described in some detail the crises and
conflicts that accompany eight specific stages
(stages of psychosocial development)
Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy
- Designed to reveal the nature of
unconscious process and conflict through
catharsis and insight
- Free association – patients are instructed
to say whatever comes to mind without
the usual socially required censoring
o Intended to reveal emotionally
charged material that may be
repressed because of too
painful/threatening to bring into
consciousness
- Couch is the symbol for psychotherapy
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- Dream analysis – therapist interprets the
contents of the dreams, supposedly
reflecting the primary process thinking of
the id
o Often difficult because the patient
may resist the efforts of the
therapist to uncover repressed and
sensitive conflicts
o Goal: help patients gain insight
into the nature of the conflicts
- Psychoanalyst – relationship of the
therapist and the patient
o Transference – patients come to
relate to the therapist much as they
did to important figures in the
childhood, particularly parents
o Patients who resent therapist but
can verbalize no good reason for it
may be reenacting childhood
resentment toward a parent
o Countertransference – therapist
project some of their own personal
issues and feelings, usually
positive to the patient
- Therapist are trained to deal with their
own feelings as well as those of their
patients, it is strictly against all ethical
cannons of the mental health professions
to accept overtures from patients that
might lead to relationship outside therapy
- Symptom substitution – eliminating
phobia/depressive episode would be little
use unless the underlying conflict was
dealt with adequately, because another
symptom may emerge
- Therapist use an eclectic mixture of
tactics, with a social and interpersonal
focus. Tactics that characterize
psychodynamic psychotherapy includes:
o Focus on affect and the expression
of patients’ emotions
o Exploration of patients’ attempts
to avoid topics/engage in activities
that hinder the progress of therapy
o Identification of patterns in
patients’ actions, thoughts,
feelings, experiences, and
relationships
o Emphasis on past experiences
o Patients’ interpersonal experiences
o Emphasis on therapeutic
relationship
o Exploration of patients’ wishes,
dreams or fantasies
- Two additional features characterize
psychodynamic psychotherapy:
o It is significantly briefer than
classical psychoanalysis
o Psychodynamic therapists
deemphasize the goal of
personality reconstruction,
focusing instead on relieving the
suffering associated with
psychological disorders
Comments
- Psychoanalysis is of historical interest
more than current interest, and classical
psychoanalysis as a treatment has been
diminishing in popularity for years
- Major criticism: basically unscientific,
relying on reports by the patient of events
that happened years ago
- Events have been filtered out through
experiences of the observer and then
interpreted in ways that certainly could be
questioned and might differ from one
analyst to another
- No careful measurement of any of these
psychological phenomena and no obvious
way to prove/disprove the basic
hypotheses of psychoanalysis
- Measurement and the ability to
prove/disprove a theory are the
foundations of the scientific approach
Humanistic Theory
- Jung and Adler emphasized the positive,
optimistic side of human nature
- Adler believed that we all strive to reach
superior levels of intellectual and moral
development
Self-actualizing – assumption that all of us could
reach our highest potential, in all areas of
functioning, if only we had the freedom to grow;
every person is basically good and whole, most
blocks originated outside the individual
Abraham Maslow – postulated the hierarchy of
needs. He hypothesized that we cannot progress
up the hierarchy until we have satisfied the needs
at lower levels
Carl Rogers – originated person-centered
therapy (the therapist takes a passive role,
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
making as few interpretations as possible, giving
the individual a chance to develop during the
course of therapy, unfettered by threats to the
self)
- Humanistic theorists have the faith in the
ability of human relations to foster this
growth
- Unconditional positive regard –
complete and almost unqualified
acceptance of most of the client’s feelings
and actions, is critical to the humanistic
approach
- Empathy – sympathetic understanding of
the individual’s particular view of the
world
- Result of the therapy is that clients will be
more straight-forward and honest with
themselves and will access their innate
tendencies toward growth
Humanistic approach has had a substantial effect
on theories of interpersonal relationships.
- This also emphasized the importance of
the therapeutic relationship in a way quite
different from Freud’s approach
- Humanistic therapists believed that
relationships, including the therapeutic
relationship, were the single most positive
influence in facilitating human growth
The humanistic model contributed little new
information to the field of psychopathology.
- They had little interest in doing research
that would discover/create new
knowledge
- They stressed unique, nonquantifiable
experiences of the individual,
emphasizing that people are more
different than alike
- This model found its greatest application
among individuals without psychological
disorders
Behavioral Model
- Also known as the cognitive-behavioral
model/social learning model
Pavlov and Classical Conditioning
Classical conditioning – type of learning in
which a neutral stimulus is paired with a response
until it elicits that response
- Conditioning (conditioned response) – a
response that occurred only on the
condition of the presence of a particular
event/situation (stimulus)
- Conditioning is one way we acquire new
information, particularly information that
is somewhat emotional in nature
Stimulus generalization – responses generalize
to similar stimuli; this particular reaction is
distressing and uncomfortable, particularly if it
associated with a variety of objects/situations
- Classical conditioning process begins with
a stimulus that would elicit a response in
almost anyone and requires no learning;
no conditions must be present for the
response to occur
o Unconditioned stimulus (UCS) –
food and chemotherapy
o Unconditioned response (UCR) –
natural/unlearned response
o Conditioned stimulus (CS) and
conditioned response (CR)
- CR can be learned in one trial. Most
learning of this type requires repeated
pairing of the UCS and the CS
- Presentation of the CS without a stimulus
for a long period of time would eventually
eliminate the CR. This process is called
extinction
Edward Titchener – emphasized the study of
introspection
- Subjects simply reported on their inner
thoughts and feelings after experiencing
certain stimuli, but the results of this
“armchair” psychology were inconsistent
and discouraging to many experimental
psychologists
Watson and the Rise of Behaviorism
John B. Watson – founder of behaviorism
- He decided to base psychology on
introspection
o “Psychology, as the behaviorist
views it, is a purely objective
experimental branch of natural
science. Its theoretical goal is
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
prediction and control of behavior.
Introspection forms no essential
part of this methods”
- Little Albert experiment – considered
unethical in today’s standards, and it turns
out Albert may have also had some
neurological impairment that could
contribute to developing fear
Mary Cover Jones – thought that if fear could be
learned/classically conditioned in this way,
perhaps it could also be unlearned/extinguished
The Beginnings of Behavior Therapy
Joseph Wolpe – became dissatisfied with
prevailing psychoanalytic interpretations of
psychopathology and began looking for
something else
- Systematic desensitization – similar to
treatment of little Peter (fear is gradually
unlearned): individuals were gradually
introduced to objects/situations they
feared so that their fear could extinguish;
they could test reality and see that nothing
bad happened in the presence of the
phobic object/scene
o Also added another element by
having patients do something that
was incompatible with fear while
they were in the presence of the
dread object/situation
o Because he could not always
reproduce the phobic object in his
office, he had his patients carefully
and systematically imagine the
phobic scene, and the response he
chose was relaxation because it
was convenient
- Wolpe, Eysenck, and Stanley Rachman –
called the approach behavior therapy (use
of desensitization and the wide-scale
applications of the new science of
behaviorism of psychopathology)
- Wolpe’s procedures are seldom used
today, they paved way for modern-day
fear and anxiety reduction procedures in
which severe phobias can be eliminated as
little as 1 day
B.F Skinner and Operant Conditioning
- The Behavior of Organisms (principles of
operant conditioning, a type of learning in
which behavior changes as a function of
what follows the behavior)
- Walden Two – depicts a fictional society
run on the principles of operant
conditioning
- Beyond Freedom and Dignity – he lays
out a broader statement of problems
facing our culture and suggests solutions
based on his own view of a science of
behavior
Edward L. Thorndike
- Law of effect – behavior is either
strengthened (likely to be repeated more
frequently) or weakened (likely to occur
less frequently) depending on the
consequences of that behavior
Skinner coined the term operant conditioning
because behavior operates on the environment
and changes it in some ways.
- Most things that we do socially provide
the context for other people to respond to
us in one way or another, thereby
providing consequences for our behavior.
The same is true of our physical
environment, although consequences may
be long term
- Reinforcement – “reward” because it
connotes the effect of behavior
o All our behavior is governed to
some degree of reinforcement,
which can be arranged in an
endless variety of ways, in
schedules of reinforcements
o Using punishment as a
consequence is relatively
ineffective in the long run and that
the primary way to develop new
behavior is to positively reinforce
desired behavior
- Skinner did not see the need to go beyond
the observable behavior and quantifiable
to establish a satisfactory science of
behavior
- Skinner did not deny the influence of
biology or the existence of subjective
states of emotion/cognition; he simply
explained these phenomena as relatively
inconsequential side effects of a particular
history of reinforcement
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
- Shaping – a process of reinforcing
successive approximations to a final
behavior or set of behaviors
Pavlov, Watson, and Skinner contributed
significantly to behavior therapy, in which
scientific principles of psychology are applied to
clinical problems.
Comments
- Behavioral model is incomplete and
inadequate to account for what we know
about psychopathology
- Disorders were considered
environmentally determined reactions
- This model also accounts for development
of psychopathology across the lifespan
The Present: The Scientific Method and an
Integrative Approach
- Supernatural explanations have little
influence on scientists and other
professionals
- Biological, psychoanalytic, and behavioral
models continue to further our knowledge
of psychopathology
- Each tradition fails in many ways:
o Scientific methods were not often
applied to the theories and
treatments within a tradition,
mostly because methods would
have produced evidence necessary
to confirm/disprove the theories
and treatments had not been
developed (this leads to people
believing to various fads and
superstitions that proved to be
untrue/useless)
o Health professionals tend to look
as psychological disorders
narrowly, from their own point of
view alone
- Watson assumed that all behaviors,
including disordered behavior, were the
result of psychological and social
influences and that the contribution of
biological factors was inconsequential
- Developments that shed light to the nature
of psychopathology
o Increasing sophistication
scientific tools and methodology
o Realization that no one influence
—biological, behavioral,
cognitive, emotional/social—even
occurs in isolation
- Our behavior, both normal and abnormal,
is the product of a continual interaction of
psychological, biological, and social
influences
- Adolf Meyer – considered the dean of
American psychiatry
o He emphasized the equal
contributions of biological,
psychological, and sociocultural
determinism
CHAPTER 2: AN INTEGRATIVE
APPROACH TO PSYCHOPATHOLOGY
- Biological dimensions include causal
factors from the fields of genetics and
neuroscience
- Psychological dimensions include causal
factors from the behavioral and cognitive
processes, including learned helplessness,
social learning, prepared learning, and
even unconscious process
- Emotional influences contribute in a
variety of ways to psychopathology, as do
social and interpersonal influences
- Developmental influences figure in any
discussion of causes of psychological
disorders
- No influence operates in isolation. Each
dimension, biological or psychological, is
strongly influenced by the others and by
development, and they weave together in
various complex and intricate ways to
create a psychological disorder
One Dimensional vs. Multidimensional Models
One dimensional Model
- Attempts to trace the origin of behavior to
a single cause
- Ex: schizophrenia/phobia is caused by
chemical imbalance/by growing up
surrounded by overwhelming conflicts
among family members
Multidimensional Model
of
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
- Most scientists and clinicians believe
abnormal behavior results from multiple
influences
- Systemic – system; any particular
influence contributing to psychopathology
cannot be considered out of context
- Context – biology and behavior of the
individual, as well as cognitive,
emotional, social and cultural
environment, because any component of
the system inevitably affects the other
components, forming a complex network
What Caused Judy’s Phobia?
 Behavioral Influences
- Unconditioned response to the
stimulus
- Classical conditioning is
considered
- Stimulus generalization
contributes
 Biological Influences
- Vasovagal syncope – a common
cause of fainting
- Syncope – means “sinking feeling” or
“swoon” caused by low blood pressure
in the head
- The amount of blood reaching her
brain diminished until she lost
consciousness
- Sinoaortic baroreflex arc – sudden
increase in blood pressure by lowering
it
- The tendency to overcompensate
seems to be inherited, a trait that may
account for the high rate of blood-
injection-injury phobia in families
- 61% of the family members of
individuals with the phobia has a
similar condition, although somewhat
milder in most cases
- Many people rather severe syncope
reaction tendencies do not develop
phobias. They cope with their reaction
in various ways, including tensing
their muscles whenever they are
confronted with blood
- The cause of blood-injection-injury-
phobia is caused by a biological
dysfunction (an overactive vasovagal
mechanism) or a traumatic
experience (seeing a gruesome film)
and seeing a subsequent conditioning
- In adopting a one-dimensional causal
model, we would miss the important
point: to cause blood-injection-injury-
phobia, a complex interaction must
occur between emotional, cognitive,
social, biological, and behavioral
factors. Inheriting a strong syncope
reaction definitely puts a person at risk
for developing this phobia, but other
influences are at work as well
 Emotional Influences
- What role did Judy’s fear and anxiety
play in the development of her phobia,
and where did it come from?
- Emotions can affect physiological
responses such as blood pressure,
also
heart rate, and respiration, particularly
if we know rationally there is nothing
also
to fear, as Judy did
- Rapid increases in heart rate caused by
her emotions may have triggered a
stronger and more intense baroreflex.
Emotions also changed the way she
thought about situations involving
blood and injury and motivated her to
behave in ways she didn’t want to,
avoiding all situations connected with
blood and injury, even if it was
important not to avoid them
- Emotions play a substantial role in the
development of many disorders
 Developmental Influences
- Life span development
- As time passes, many things about
ourselves and our environments
change in important ways, causing us
to react differently at different ages
- Developmental critical period –
when we are more or less reactive to a
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
given situation or influence than other
times
- Why did this problem develop when
she was 16 years old and not before?
Is it possible that her susceptibility to
having a vasovagal reaction was
highest in her teenage years?
- The timing of her physiological
reaction, along with viewing the
disturbing biology film, provided the
combination to initiate her severe
phobic response
Genetics and Psychopathology
Genes – long molecules of deoxyribonucleic acid
(DNA) at various locations on chromosomes,
within the cell nucleus
- Gene endowment; other factors in the
environment influence our physical
appearance. To some extent, our
weight and even our height are
affected by nutritional, social, and
cultural factors
- Our genes seldom determine our
physical development in any absolute
way. Exactly where we go within
these boundaries depends on
environmental influences
Huntington’s Disease – causes involuntary
shaking or jerkiness through the body
- Degenerative brain disease that
appears in early to middle age, usually
the early 40s
- Causes mild or major neurocognitive
disorder (early onset is ranging from
40-50s; occur during the older age)
- Traced as a genetic defect that causes
deterioration in the basal ganglia
- It causes broad changes in personality,
cognitive functioning, and motor
behavior
Major Neurocognitive Disorder
- Evidence of significant cognitive
decline from a previous level of
performance (such as complex
attention, executive function
(planning), learning and memory,
language, perceptual motor or social
cognition) in one or more cognitive
domains
o Concern of the individual, a
knowledgeable informant, or
the clinician that there has
been a significant decline in
cognitive function
o Substantial impairment in
cognitive performance,
preferably documented by
standardized
neuropsychological testing, or
in its absence, another
quantified clinical assessment
(psychological test comes in
handy; intelligence test)
o Also applicable to mild
neurocognitive disorders
o Others also experience
agnosia, or remember the
names of other people
o Amnesia is not the same as the
neurocognitive disorder,
because they are not limited to
memory (it includes a lot of
domains)
o Mental statue examination
(in clinical and industrial; very
important)
Mild Neurocognitive Disorder
- Evidence of modest cognitive decline
from a previous level of performance
in one or more cognitive domains
o Concern of the individual, a
knowledgeable informant, or
the clinician that there has
been a mild decline in
cognitive function
o Modest impairment in
cognitive performance,
preferably documented by
standardized
neuropsychological testing, or
in its absence, another
quantified clinical assessment
Phenylketonuria (PKU) – can result in mental
retardation
- This disorder, present at birth is
caused by the inability of the body to
metabolize (breakdown)
phenylalanine, a chemical compound
found in many foods
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
- Present at birth, and is passed on when
both parents are carriers of the gene
- Causes intellectual disability
- Possible correction through proper
diet management – prevention rather
than cure (restriction of phenylalanine
in the diet as early as possible, or until
the diet no longer affects the brain
usually 6-7 of age)
- Way to correct the disorder: change
the way the environment interacts with
and affects the genetic expression of
this disorder
The Nature of Genes
- Each normal human cell has 46
chromosomes arranged in 23 pairs
(one chromosome in each pair comes
from the mother and also from the
father)
- first 22 pairs of chromosomes provide
programs or direction for the
development of the body and brain
Sex chromosome – determine an individual’s sex
X chromosomes – in females, both chromosomes
in the 23rd pair
Y chromosomes – in males, the mother
contributes an x chromosome while the mother is
the y chromosome
- X and Y chromosomes is responsible
for variance in biological sex
- 160 million parts in the X
chromosome. The ordering of these
base influences how the body
develops and works
Dominant gene – one pair of genes that strongly
influences a particular trait, and we need only one
of them to determine such as the eye or hair color
- Occurs when one member of a gene
pair is consistently expressed over the
other
- Mendelian laws of genetics – predict
fairly accurately how many offspring
will develop at a certain trat,
characteristics, or disorders depending
on whether one or both of the parents
carry the dominant gene
Polygenic – influenced by many genes, each
contributing only a tiny effect, all of which, may
be influenced by the environment
Recessive gene – must be paired with another
recessive gene to determine a trait
Genome – an individual’s complete set of genes
—consists of more than 20,000 genes, polygenic
interactions can be quite complex
Quantitative genetics – sums up all the tiny
effects across many genes without necessarily
telling us which genes are responsible for which
effects
Molecular genetics – focuses on examining the
actual structure of genes with increasingly
advanced technologies such as DNA
microarrays (allow scientists to analyze
thousands of genes at once and identify broad
networks of genes that may be contributing to a
particular trait)
- Genes exert their influences on our
bodies and our behavior through a
series of steps that produces proteins
- Only a small portion of our genes in
any one cell are “turned on” or
expressed
- Environmental factors, in the form of
social and cultural influences, can
determine whether genes are “turned
on”
Genes and Behavior
- According to research, about half of
one’s enduring personality traits are
cognitive abilities are attributed to
genetic influence
- Adverse environmental influence can
affect the influence of genes
- Genetic factors determined stability in
cognitive abilities, whereas
environmental factors were
responsible for any changes
- Adverse life events such as a
“chaotic” childhood can overwhelm
the influence of genes
- Study showed marked variability or
change in cognitive abilities if his or
her environment changed dramatically
from the other twins because of some
stressful events such as death of a
loved one
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
- For psychological disorders, the
evidence indicates that genetic factors
make some contribution to all
disorders but account for less than half
of the explanation
o If one pair of identical twins
has schizophrenia, there is a
less-than-50% likelihood that
the other twin will also have
schizophrenia
- Behavioral genetics have reached
general conclusions:
o Specific genes or small groups
of genes may ultimately be
found to be associated with
certain psychological
disorders, as suggested in
several important studies.
Contributions to psychological
disorders come from many
genes, each having a relatively
small effect
o Linkage studies – scientists
study individuals who have the
same disorders, such as bipolar
disorders, and also share the
same features, such as eye
color; because the location of
the gene for eye color is
known, this allows scientists to
attempt to “link” known gene
locations with the possible
location of a gene contributing
to the disorder
o It has become increasingly
clear that genetic contributions
cannot be studied in the
absence of interactions with
events in the environment that
trigger genetic vulnerability or
“turn on” specific genes
Gene and Environment Interaction
Eric Kandel – speculated the process of learning
affects more than behavior
- Suggested that very genetic structure
of cells may change as a result of
learning if genes that were inactive or
dormant interact with the environment
in such a way that they become active
- The environment may occasionally
turn on certain genes. This mechanism
may lead to changes in the number of
receptors at the end of a neuron, which
in turn would affect biochemical
functioning in the brain
- The brain, like any other parts of the
body, may well be influenced by
environmental changes during
development. But we also assume that
once maturity is reached, the structure
and function of out internal organs and
most of our physiology are set or hard-
wired
- The brain is subject to continual
change in response to the
environment, even at the level of
genetic structure
Diathesis-Stress Model – indicates that
tendencies for certain traits or behaviors to be
activated certain conditions
- Diathesis – condition that makes
someone susceptible to developing a
disorder. When the right kind of life
event, such as a certain type of
stressor, comes along, the disorder
develops
- Vulnerability – would not become
prominent until certain environmental
events occurred (emotional exposure
that comes with the degree of
uncertainty)
- Diathesis is genetically based and the
stress is environmental but that they
must interact to produce a disorder
- The smaller the vulnerability, the
greater the life stress required to
produce the disorder; conversely, with
greater vulnerability, less life stress is
required
- Chemical transporter study by Caspi
et. Al
o Short and long alleles
o Chemical transporter and the
5-HTT gene
o Demonstrated that neither
genes nor life experiences
(environmental events) can
solely explain the onset of a
disorder such as depression. It
takes a complex interaction of
the two factors
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY

- Predisposition factors and the

precipitating factors Epigenetics and the Nongenomic
Gene-environment Correlational Model – “Inheritance” of Behavior
indicated that certain genes may increase the - Epigenetics refers to the idea that
probability that an individual will experience there are factors beyond genetics that
stressful life events influence the individual
- Reciprocal gene-environment Model - Factors beyond genetics that influence
- Genetic endowment may increase the behavior
probability that an individual will - There are instances that our
experience stressful life events experiences allow us to combat or be
- Ex: people with a genetic vulnerability resilient in developing psychological
phobia, may also have a personality disorders
trait—impulsiveness, that makes them - Nature and nurture develops resilience
more likely to be involved in minor in developmental disorder
accidents that would result them in o Lab rat study by Francis et al.
seeing blood (1999)
o They are accident prone - Stress reactivity and
because they are continually how it passes through
rushing to complete things or generations
to get to places without regard - Cross-fostering – rat
for their physical safety pup born to one mother
o These people might have a is assigned to another
genetically determined mother
tendency to create the very - Maternal behavior
environment risk factors that affected how the young
trigger a genetic vulnerability rats tolerated stress
to blood-injury-injection - Calm and supportive
phobia behavior by mothers
- Ex: individuals with depressive could be passed down
predispositions, these individuals through generations of
might seek out difficult relationships rats independent of
leading to more stress, circumstances genetic influence
and more environmental instances that o Primate study by Suomi (1999)
lead to severe or worse depression - Environmental effects
- Some evidence indicates that it applies of early parenting seem
to the development of depression, to override any genetic
because some people may tend to seek contribution to be
out difficult relationships or other anxious, emotional or
circumstances that lead to depression reactive to stress
- Nonreactive surrogates
18
 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
o Adoption study by Tiernari et
al. (1994)
- Found that children
whose parents have
schizophrenia and were
adopted away as babies
demonstrated a
tendency to develop
psychiatric disorders
(including
schizophrenia)
themselves only if they
were adopted into
dysfunction families
- We can talk of
heritable (genetic)
contribution only in the
context of the
individual’s past and
present environment
Despite genetic influences we cannot discount
environmental support toward the individual.
A complex interaction between genes and
environment plays an important role in every
psychological disorders.
- The earlier the intervention/therapy the
better for the children that have
developmental/psychological disorder
- To establish a positive relationship with
the parents of the child being assessed,
reassure them that it is for the
development of their child and not for
other people (teach them proper social
skills and socialization etc., allowing them
to develop)
Central and Peripheral Nervous System
Neuroscience and Psychopathology
Neuroscience – knowing how the nervous
system, how the brain works is central to any
understanding of our behavior, emotions and
cognitive processes
- Sympathetic NS primarily responsible for
mobilizing the body during times of stress
or danger by rapidly activating the organs
and glands under its control. Three things
happen:
o Heat beats faster, increasing
the flow of blood to the
muscles
o Respiration increases, allowing
more oxygen to get into the
blood and brain; and the
adrenal glands are stimulated
o All three changes mobilize us
for action (it mediates a
substantial part of our
“emergency” or “alarm”
reaction)
- Parasympathetic NS’s function is to
balance the sympathetic NS.
o It takes over after the sympathetic
nervous system that has been
active for a while, normalizing the
arousal and facilitating the storage
of energy by helping the digestive
process
- CNS processes all information received
from our sense organs and reacts as
necessary
- Spinal cord is part of the CNS, but its
primary function is to facilitate the
sending of messages to and from the
brain, which is the other major component
of the CNS an the most complex organ in
the body
- Neurons – 140 billion nerve cells, that
control our thoughts and emotions. They
also transmit information throughout the
nervous system
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
- Typical neurons contain a central cell
body with two kinds of branches
o Dendrites – have numerous
receptors that receive messages
in the form of chemical
impulses from other nerve
cells, which are converted into
electrical impulses
o Axon – transmits these
impulses to other neurons
o Synapses – any one nerve cell
may have multiple connections
to other neurons
- Within each neuron, information is
transmitted through electrical impulses,
called action potentials, traveling along
the axon of a neuron
o Terminal button – end of a
neuron
o Synaptic cleft – space between the
terminal button of one neuron and
the dendrite of another
o Neurotransmitters –
biochemicals that are released
from the axon of one neuron and
transmit the impulse to the
dendrite receptors of another
neuron; these are chemical stored
in vesicles in the terminal buttons
(basic/fundamental units of the
brain/nervous system)

Glia/Glial cells
- Cells outnumber neurons by a ratio of
about 10 to 1, for many years they were
little studied because scientists believed
that they were passive cells that merely
served to connect and insulate neurons
- Electrical impulses are action potential - Glial cells actually play active roles in
neural activity; it is now known that there
are different types of glial cells with
several specific functions, some of which
serve to modulate neurotransmitter
activity
Excitatory – increase the likelihood that the
connecting neurons will fire

20
 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
Inhibitory – increase the likelihood that the
connecting neurons will fire
The Structure of the Brain
Brain stem – lower and more ancient part of the
brain. Found in most animals, this structure
handles most of the essential automatic
functions such as sleeping, breathing, and
moving around in a coordinated way
Forebrain – more advanced and evolved more
recently; largest part of the brain, and is
responsible for various functions such as:
o Receiving and processing sensory
information
o Emotion regulation
o Behavior regulation
o Motor coordination
o Perception
- Thalamus and hypothalamus – involved
broadly with regulating behavior and
emotions. These structures function
primarily as a relay between the forebrain
and the remaining lower areas of the brain
stem
- Limbic system – limbic means border, so
named because it is located around the
edge of the center of the brain; regulates
emotion memory
o Hippocampus – sea horse
o Cingulate gyrus – girdle
o Septum – partition
o Amygdala – almond
- The limbic system helps regulate our
emotional experiences and expressions
and our ability to learn and control our
impulses. It is also involved with the basic
drives of sex, aggression, hunger, and
thirst
- Basal ganglia – caudate (tailed) nucleus;
damage of these structures is involved in
changing our posture/twitching/shaking,
they are believed to be control of motor
activity
- Cerebral cortex – contains more than
80% of all neurons in the central nervous
system. This part of the brain provides us
with our distinctly human qualities,
allowing us to look to the future and plan,
to reason, and to create
o Divided into two hemispheres
(both are capable of perceiving,
thinking, and remembering),
recent research indicates that each
has different specialties
o Left hemisphere – chiefly
responsible for verbal and other
cognitive processes
o Right hemisphere – better at
perceiving the world around us
and creating images
- Four different lobes:
o Temporal lobe – associated with
recognizing various sights and
sounds with long-term memory
storage
o Parietal lobe – associated with
recognizing various sensations of
touch and monitoring body
positioning
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
o Occipital lobe – associated with
integrating and making sense of
various visual inputs
o Frontal lobe – most interesting
from the point of view of
psychopathology
- Prefrontal cortex – -
responsible for higher
cognitive functions such as
thinking and reasoning,
planning for the future, and
long-term memory
- It synthesizes all
information received from
other parts of the brain and
decides how to respond. It
is what enables us to
behave as social animals
The temporal, parietal, and occipital lobe work
together to process sight, touch, hearing, and
other signals from our senses.
When studying areas of the brain for clues of
psychopathology, most researchers focus on the
frontal lobe of the cerebral cortex, as well as on
the limbic system and the basal ganglia.
Hindbrain – contains the medulla, pons, and the
cerebellum. It regulates many automatic activities
such as breathing, the pumping actions of the
heart, and digestion; in charge in motor
coordination
- Cerebellum – controls motor
coordination, and recent researchers
suggests that abnormalities in the
cerebellum may be associated with
autism, although connection with motor
coordination is not clear
Midbrain – coordinates movement with
sensory input and contain parts of the reticular
activating system – which contributes to
processes of arousal and tension, such as whether
we are awake or asleep
Peripheral Nervous System
- It coordinates with the brain stem to make
sure the body is working properly
- Major components:
o Somatic nervous system –
controls the muscles, so damage in
this area might make it difficult for
us to engage in any voluntary
movement, including talking
o Autonomic nervous system –
includes sympathetic nervous
system and parasympathetic
nervous system
Primary duties of the autonomic nervous
system are to regulate the cardiovascular
system (heart and blood vessels) and the
endocrine system (pituitary, adrenal,
thyroid, and gonadal glands) and to
perform various functions, including
aiding digestion and regulating body
temperature
- Endocrine system works differently from
other systems in the body. Each endocrine
gland produces its own chemical
messenger called a hormone, and releases
it directly into the bloodstream
o Closely related to immune system;
it is also implicated in a variety of
disorders
o Endocrine regulation may play a
role in depression, anxiety,
schizophrenia and other disorders
o Ex: depressed patients may
respond better to an antidepressant
medication if it is administered in
combination with a thyroid
hormone or some older depressed
men coadministration of
testosterone may enhance
antidepressants effects
(psychoneuroendocrinology)
- Adrenal glands produce epinephrine
(also called adrenaline) in response to
stress, as well as salt-regulating
hormones; the thyroid gland produces
thyroxine, which facilitates energy
metabolism and growth; the pituitary is a
master gland that produces a variety of
regulatory hormones; and the gonadal
glands produces sex hormones such as
estrogen and testosterone
One brain connection implicated in some
psychological disorders involve the hypothalamus
and the endocrine system.
- The hypothalamus connects to the
adjacent pituitary gland, which is the
master or coordinator for the endocrine
system
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
- Pituitary gland in return may stimulate the
cortical part of the adrenal glands on top
of the kidneys
- Surges of the epinephrine tend to energize
us, arouse us, and get our bodies ready for
threat or challenge
o Cortical part of the adrenal glands
also produces the stress hormone
cortisol. This system is called the
hypothalamic-pituitary-
adrenocortical axis or HPA axis;
it has been implicated in several
psychological disorders
o Dysregulation in HPA axis is
linked to depression
Psychoneuroendocrinology
- Refers to the clinical area of study on
hormone fluctuations and its relationship
to human behavior
- Sample studies:
o Patients may respond better to
antidepressants medication when
administered along with a thyroid
hormone
o Coadministration of testosterone
may enhance effects of anti-
depressants
Gotlib and colleagues telomere study (2015)
- Telomere – a specific feature of a
chromosome, appears to moderate the
effects of depression and cortisol
- These are certain structures that cap the
ends of chromosomes to protect the
chromosome from deteriorating or getting
entangled with neighboring chromosome
o Found that daughters of depressed
mothers had shorter telomeres than
did daughters of never depressed
mothers
o Shorter telomeres were associated
with greater cortisol reactivity to
stress
Neurotransmitters
- Biochemical messages sent from neuron
to neuron to transmit information from the
signaling neuron to the receiving neuron
- How these affect psychopathology
- Two types of neurotransmitters:
monoamines and amino acids (these are
the most studied in regard to
psychopathology)
o Considered as the “classic”
neurotransmitters because they are
synthesized in the nerve
o Monoamines class –
norepinephrine/noradrenaline,
serotonin and dopamine
o Amino acids – GABA and
glutamate
How Neurotransmitters Work
- Agonists – increase activity/behavior
(mimics the effects of neurotransmitters
and eventually activate a receptor to
produce a behavior)
- Antagonists – decreases activity (drugs
block the receptors so that
neurotransmitters are unable to the
receptors, that results in lessening or
decreases the activity)
- Inverse agonists – produces the opposite
effect to an agonist (bind with active
receptors to stabilize behavior and reduce
activities; such as stimulants)
- Reuptake – after a neurotransmitter is
released, it is quickly broken down and
brought back from the synaptic cleft into
the same neuron that released it
Glutamate and GABA
- Glutamate – excitatory transmitter that
“turns on” may different neurons, leading
to action
- GABA – inhibitory neurotransmitter; to
inhibit or regulate the transmission of
information and action potentials
- Known as the “chemical brothers”
(glutamate is an excitatory neuron,
GABA is inhibitory)
- Glutamate and GABA operate relatively
independently at a molecular level, but the
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
relative balance of each in a cell will
determine whether the neuron is activated
(fires) or not
- They are fast acting, as they would have
to be for the brain to keep up with the
many influences from the environment
that require action or restraint
- GABA reduces postsynaptic activity,
which inhibits a variety of behaviors and
emotions
o reduce overall arousal and temper
our emotional responses
o reduce levels of anger, hostility,
aggression, and perhaps even
positive emotional states such as
eager anticipation and pleasure,
making it a generalized inhibiting
neurotransmitter
- Lack of GABA is associated with
anxiety
- Presence of GABA is associated with
reduced levels of anger, hostility,
aggression
- Benzodiazepines – minor tranquillizers;
make it easier for GABA molecules to
attach to neural receptors (makes the
person chill)
- Monosodium glutamate – consuming
excess of this results to headache, ringing
in the ears and other physical symptoms
Norepinephrine
Serotonin
- 5-hydroxytryptamine (technical name)
- Mood stabilizer; regulates behavior, mood
and thought processes
- Low levels are associated with aggression,
suicide, impulsive overeating, and
excessive sexual behavior
- Extremely low levels are associated with
less inhibition, instability, impulsivity and
the tendency to overreact to situations
- Low serotonin activity has been
associated with aggression, suicide,
impulsive overeating, and excessive
sexual behavior
o Low serotonin activity may make
us more vulnerable to certain
problematic behavior without
directly causing it
o High levels of serotonin may
interact with GABA to counteract
glutamate (the same fact is
emerging about neurotransmitter
system)
- Tricyclic antidepressants such as
imipramine (Tofranil)
- May have different effect depending on
the type of receptors involved
o Has 15 types and subtypes of
receptors
o Selective-serotonin reuptake
inhibitors (SSRI) – these prevents
the reabsorption of the excess
neurotransmitters; treat anxiety,
mood, and eating disorders
- Also known as noradrenaline
- Blocks receptors called alpha-adrenergic
and beta-adrenergic receptors
- Beta-blockers are often used for
hypertension or difficulties with
regulating heart rate
o Can reduce symptoms of anxiety
and panic attacks
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
- These drugs block beta-receptors so that
their response to a surge of
norepinephrine is reduced, which keeps
blood pressure and heart rate down
- These system and other related circuits
regulate or modulate certain behavioral
tendencies and is not directly involved in
specific patterns of behavior or in
psychological disorders
Dopamine
- Major neurotransmitter from the
monoamine class
- Also termed catecholamine because of
the similarity of its chemical structure to
epinephrine and norepinephrine
- Implicated in the pathophysiology of
schizophrenia and disorders of addiction;
play a significant role in depression and
attention deficit hyperactivity disorder
- Dopamine activity is associated with
exploratory, outgoing and pleasure-
seeking behaviors and serotonin is
associated with inhibition and constraints;
they balance each other
- High levels of dopamine are associated
with schizophrenia
- Low levels of dopamine are associated
with Parkinson’s disease
- L-dopa – dopamine agonist (increases
level of dopamine)
- Also includes the locomotor system,
disruption in this system also affects
motor skills
Psychosocial Influences on Brain Structure
and Function
- Psychosocial influences on brain
functioning
o Considered OCD and the
therapeutic approach to it (when
the suffering is severe and other
treatments have failed) – of new neurons
neurosurgery (psychosurgery) vs
exposure response prevention
o Brain functioning of successful
psychological treatments have
changes in brain functioning
o Intense exposure-based therapy for
specific phobia changed brain
functioning
- Interaction between psychosocial factors
and neurotransmitters
o Primate studies show that
monkeys raised with less control
showed signs of severe anxiety
and panic compared to those who
had a sense of control
o Animals who win battles of
dominance have increased
dopamine levels and vice versa
o Mice who had negative social
experiences had noted changes in
its mesolimbic dopamine system
- The use of the placebo effect and
antidepressants to patients and determine
which are more effective (depends on the
patient which are effective in decreasing
the disorder)
Interaction of Psychosocial Factors and
Neurotransmitter Systems
- Neurochemical substances, acting as a
neurotransmitter, had different effects,
depending on the psychological and
environmental history of the monkeys
(two groups: monkeys that have control of
their environment and the other have no
control)
- Psychosocial influences directly affect the
functioning and perhaps even the structure
of the central nervous system. Scientists
have observed that psychosocial factors
routinely change the activity levels of
many of our neurotransmitter systems
- Naturally occurring neurotransmitters
have different effects depending on the
previous psychosocial experience of the
organism
- Little mouse being bullied by bigger
mouse study
o BDNF – a protein that is involved
in learning by stimulating growth
o “bullying” experience produced
BDNF, which changed the usual
functioning of the mesolimbic
dopamine system from facilitating
reinforcement and even addiction
to facilitating avoidance and
isolation
Psychosocial Effects on the Development of
Brain Structure and Function
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
- Plasticity in brain structure as a result of
experiences among rats that are raised in a
rich environment compared to rats that are
active
o Stress during early development
can lead to substantial changes in
the function of the HPA axis that
makes primates more or less
susceptible to stress later in life
- Social cognition in monkeys increase their
social ranking
- Increased gray matter density in several
temporal lobe regions of the brain in
people who have larger Facebook
networks
- Early psychological experiences affect the
development of the nervous system and
determines vulnerability to psychological
disorders in later life
- CNS and NS continuously changes and
adapts to the environment due to learning
and experiences
Behavioral and Cognitive Science
- Cognitive science – concerned with how
we acquire and process information and
how we store and ultimately retrieve it
(one of the processes involved in
memory)
- We are not aware of a great deal of what
goes on inside our heads
- These cognitive processes are
unconscious, some findings recall the
unconscious mental processes
Conditioning and Cognitive Processes
- Two different conditions produce two
different learning outcomes is a
commonsense notion, but it demonstrates,
along with many far more complex
scientific findings, that basic classical
(and operant) conditioning paradigms
facilitate learning of the relationship
among events in the environment
o There are difference in the
experience of two dogs, one is that
the metronome is the result of the
meat powder while the other dog
is that the metronome is not
essential and that the meat powder
sometimes came after
- Complex cognitive processing of
information as well as emotional
processing, is involved when conditioning
occurs, even in animals
Learned Helplessness
- Coined by Martin Seligman indicating
that when animals encounter conditions in
which they have no control they will give
up on attempting to cope and seem to
develop depression
- People become depressed if they “decide”
or “think” they can do little about the
stress in their lives, even if it seems to
others that there is something they could
do
- People make an attribution that they have
no control, and they become depressed
- The necessity that different people process
information about events in the
environment in different ways. These
cognitive differences are an important
component of psychopathology
Learned Optimism
- According to Seligman, individuals, even
in the face of considerable stress will
likely function better when they display
an optimistic and upbeat attitude
o Seniors who have positive views
about themselves live around 7.5
years longer compared to those
with non-optimistic attitudes
- Positive psychology
Social Learning
- Pioneered by Albert Bandura
- Became known as modeling or
observational learning
- Requires symbolic integration of the
experiences of others with judgements of
what might happen to oneself; even an
animal that is not intelligent by human
standards, must make decisions about the
conditions under which its own
experiences would be similar to those of
the animal it is observing
- The importance of social context of our
learning, much of what we learn depends
on our interactions with other people
around us
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
- Concept of probability learning,
information processing, and attention have
become increasingly important in
psychopathology
o Careful analysis of cognitive
processes may well produce the
most accurate scientific
predictions of behavior
- Relevant in understanding that as
behaviors can be learned can be applied in
psychopathology
- Primary trauma or secondary trauma that
is likened to PTSD
Prepared Learning
- Indicates that humans are highly prepared
to learn about certain types of objects or
situations over the course of evolution
because this knowledge contributes to the
survival of species
o Fear of snakes and spiders are
more probable compared to fear of
rocks or flowers (women are more
afraid of snakes and spiders than
men because they do not hunt for
food, they are more on plants etc.)
o Tendency to fear may due to
ancestral/evolutionary factors
o Survival is associated with quickly
learning to avoid poisonous food
o Selective associations are also
facilitated in our genes and depend
on the context and nature of the
associated stimuli
Cognitive Science and the Unconscious
- Blind sight/unconscious vision – able to
function visually but no awareness or
memory of their visual abilities
(dissociation)
o Same thing occurs in healthy
individuals who have been
hypnotized
- Unconscious is seen as the lack of
awareness and the processing and storing
of information prior to action
o Consider the idea of implicit
memory/behavior
o Explicit memory
- Freud’s speculations of the unconscious
went beyond evidence
o “There is no evidence to support
the existence of an unconscious
with such a complex structure and
array of functions”
o Occasional paralysis
- Black box – refers to unobservable
feelings and cognitions inferred from an
individual’s self-report or behaviors
Emotions
Flight or fight response – alarm reaction that
activates during potentially life-threatening
emergencies
- The whole purpose of the physical rush of
adrenaline that we feel in extreme danger
is to mobilize us to escape danger (flight)
or to fend it off (fight)
The Physiology and Purpose of Fear
- Fear activates the cardiovascular system
- “White with fear” and “trembling with
fear”
- “Dry mouth” of fear
- The pressure to urinate, defecate or vomit
Emotional Phenomena
- Emotion of fear is a subjective feeling of
terror, a strong motivation of behavior
(escaping or fighting) and a complex
psychological arousal response
- Emotion is linked to an action tendency –
tendency to behave in a certain way (for
example escape), elicited by external
event (a threat) and a feeling state (terror)
and accompanied by a (possibly)
characteristic physiological response
- Any emotional experience is associated
with approach and avoidance tendencies
- One purpose of a feeling state is to
motivate us to carry out a behavior: if we
escape, our terror which is unpleasant,
will be decreased, so decreasing an
unpleasant feeling motivated us to escape
- Emotions are usually short-lived,
temporary states lasting from several
minutes to several hours, occurring in
response to an external event
- Mood is more persistent period of affect
or emotionality
o Enduring or recurring states of
depression or excitement (mania)
as mood disorders
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
o Anxiety and emotional disorders
- Affect – often refers to the valence
dimension (pleasant/positive and
unpleasant/negative) of an emotion
o Can also refer to momentary
emotional tone that accompanies
what we say or do
- Arousal dimension (activated or high
arousal vs. deactivated or low arousal) -
any emotional experience can be assigned
as a point on this two-dimensional system
known as circumplex model of emotions
o Another dimension is time that
could be added to specify whether
the emotional experience is short
or long-lasting
- Affective style – sometimes used to
summarize commonalities among
emotional state characteristic of an
individual. Thus, someone who tends to
be fearful, anxious, and depressed as a
negative style, whereas sometimes with a
positive affective style would subsume, or
include tendencies to be generally
pleasant, joyful, excited, and so on
The Components of Emotion
- Emotions is composed of behavior,
physiology and cognition but most
emotion scientist focus on one component
or another
o Emphasizing that emotion is a way
of communicating between one
member of the species and another
(behavioral pattern)
o Emotions are contagious
- Emotions as brain functions (physiology)
o Emotional expression is ancient
and primitive than in areas
associated with higher cognitive
processes, such as reasoning
o Experience various emotions
quickly and directly without
necessarily thinking about them or
being aware of why you feel that
way you do
- Emotions as cognition
o Changes in a person’s
environment are appraised in
terms of their potential impact on
the person. Type of appraisal
determines the emotion you
experience
o Although cognitive and emotional
systems interact and overlap, they
are fundamentally separated
Anger at Heart
- Sustained hostility with anger outbursts
and repeatedly and continually
suppressing anger contributes more
strongly to death from heart disease than
other well-known factors such as
smoking, high blood pressure, and high
cholesterol levels
- Anger affects the heart through decreased
pumping efficiency, at least in people who
already have heart disease
o Forgiveness rather than anger
Emotions and Psychopathology
- Suppressing almost any kind of emotional
response, such as anger or fear, increases
sympathetic nervous activity, which may
contribute to psychopathology
o Mania which is part of a serious
mood disorder called bipolar
disorder
o Depression
- Basic emotions of fear, anger, sadness or
distress, and excitement may contribute to
many psychological disorders and may
even define them
- Emotions and mood also affect our
cognitive processes
Cultural, Social and Interpersonal Factors
- Fright disorders – characterized by
exaggerated startle responses, and other
observable fear and anxiety reactions
o Susto – describes various anxiety-
based symptoms, including
insomnia, irritability, phobias, and
the marked somatic symptoms of
sweating and increased heart rate
(tachycardia)
o Susto has only one cause: the
individuals believes that he or she
has become an object of black
magic, or witchcraft, and is
suddenly badly frightened
o Evil eye – resulting in fright
disorder that can be fatal
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 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY
- Fear and phobias are universal, occurring and other psychological disorders (pets,
across al cultures. But what we fear is social and cultural relationships)
strongly influenced by our social
environment Life-Span Development
- Cultural factors influence the form and - “The end of history” illusion – makes us
content of psychopathology and many think that we will change very little in the
differ even among cultures side by side in years to come
the same country - To understand psychopathology, we must
Gender appreciate how experiences during
different periods of development may
- Gender roles have a strong and sometimes influence our vulnerability to other types
puzzling effect on psychopathology of stress or to different psychological
- Likelihood of having a particular phobia disorders
is powerfully influenced by the gender - Influences of developmental stages and
- Men and women may respond differently prior experience has a substantial impact
to the same standardized psychological on the development and presentation of
treatment psychological disorders, an inference that
o Well-established ability of women is receiving confirmation from
to recall emotional memories sophisticated life-span development
somewhat better than men may
The Principle of Equifinality
facilitate emotional processing and
long-term treatment gains Equifinality – used in developmental
- “Tend and befriend” – protecting psychopathology to indicate that we must
themselves and their young through consider a number of paths to a given outcome
nurturing behavior (tend) and forming
alliances with larger social groups, - Different paths can also result from the
particularly other females (occur in interaction of psychological and
females) biological factors during various stages of
o Female responds to stress because development
it builds on the brain’s attachment-
caregiving system and leads to
nurturing and affiliative behavior
o Response is characterized by
identifiable neurobiological
processes in the brain that are
gender specific
- Gender roles is a social and cultural factor
that influences the form and content of a
disorder
Social effects on Health and Behavior
- The greater the number and frequency of
social relationships and contacts, the
longer you are likely to live
- Social relationships seem to protect
individuals against many physical and
psychological disorders such as high
blood pressure, depression, alcoholism,
arthritis, progression of AIDS etc.
- Interpersonal relationships are necessary
and also help individuals battle loneliness

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