Psychology - abnormalities - studies

Deviation from social norms - cultural relativity - Reported that in Britain black afro-caribbean immigrants were between 2 and 7 times more likely to be diagnosed with scizophrenia than white people

Who came up with the definition of deviation from ideal mental health

Limitation of deviation from ideal mental health - Argues that using the above criteria would mean that most people would be considered abnormal becuase it would be difficult to maintain all six criteria all of the time as we go through times of stress

Who came up with the definition of failure to function adequately

Physical causes of mental disorders - infection - Found 14% of cases linked to exposure to the flu virus in the womb in the first 3 months of pregnancy

Physical causes of mental disorders - biochemisty - Link between schizophrenia and excess levels of dopamine and depression linked with decrease availability of serotonin - supported by PET scans which measures the action of neurotransmitters

Physical causes of mental disorders - genetic inheritance - Found the concordance rate of schizophrenia in non-identical twins was 9% but for identical twins it rose to 42%

Physical causes of mental disorders - genetic inheritance - Found that first degree relatives of schizophrenia were 18x more likely to develop the illness than a matched control group

Physical causes of mental disorders - genetic inheritance - Found in 13 families where there was a case of schizophenia, these families contained multiple cases in 3 or more generations. They took DNA samples and found strong evidence that certain chromosomes are linked to schizophrenia and passed on through generations

Evaluation of drug therapies - reviewed 38 studies of antidepressants and found patients who received placebos fared almost as well as those getting real drugs, suggesting the beneficial effects of drugs may be caused largely by the placebo effect

Evaluation of drug therapies - Compared use of tricyclics (antidepressants) and placebos in 28 studies and found a success rate of 35% for placebos and 60% for tricyclics. So even though there was a placebo effect, this was far less effective than the tricyclics.

Evaluation of drug treatments - Found that relapse rates were lower for schizophrenics treated with antipsychotic drugs, when compared to placebo's as a treatment

Evaluation of ECT - states that 60-70% of ECT patients improve after treatment

Evaluation of ECT - found 84% of patients relapsed withing six months of having ECT

Evaluation of ECT - Reviewed patient surveys and only around half of ECT patients believe they were given enough inforomation before their treatment

Psychoanalysis - Anna O

Evaluation of psychoanalysis - Following psychoanalysis, patients were better off than 80% of untreated patients

Evaluation of psychoanalysis - Reviewed 24 studies into the effectiveness of psychoanalysis and found 23 of those studies suggested psychoanalysis was as effective as the other standard therapies

Evaluation of psychoanalysis - Has criticised the therapeutic relationship in psychoanalysis as one where all the power liew with the analyst, and they may abuse their power. Client is expected to accept what the analyst says

Classical conditioning

Little Albert and white rat experiment

Operant conditioning

Modelling (social learning)

Modelling - Showed that monkeys could develop a snake phobia by simply observing another monkey being fearful in the presence of a snake

Little Peter and fear of white rabbit experiment

Evalution of little Peter experiment - suggests that its the exposure to the feared stimulus, not the pleasant stimulus that is most important feature of SD. Design of study makes it impossible to tell which feature had greatest effect

SD - managing dog phobia

Flooding - Carried out an experiment which demonstrated flooding. He took a girl who was scared of cars and drove her around for hours. Initially the girl was hysterical but she eventually calmed down when she realised that she was safe.

Evaluation of SD:
SD treatment group: 87% patients free of panic
Drug treatment group: 50% free of panic
Placebo group: 36% free of panic

Evaluation of behavioural therapies - flooding was significantly more effective at treating phobias than SD, but was so traumatic that frequently walked out or didn't return

Evaluation of behavioural therapies - aversion therapy - found 81% of alcoholics abstained at 6 months, with 71% still abstinent at 20 months

Cognitive approach - cognitive triad - model of depression

ABC model
Activating event, Beliefs and Consequences

Evaluation of cognitive approach - longitudinal study on uni students, they were assessed at start of first yr to identify those who showed signs of negative thinking. After 2.5 years it showed 17% of high risk group and 1% of low risk group developed depression

Evaluation of cognitive behavioural therapy - reviewed 16 meta-analyses. Concluded that CBT was very effective for treating depression, anxiety and panic disorders and moderately effective for marital distress and anger

Evaluation of cognitive behavioural therapy - found that at a 15 month follow-up more patients were acstaining from alcohol after psychoanalysis than after CBT

Evaluation of cognitive behavioural therapy - relapse rates for depression:
Drugs + CBT = 25%
Drugs + standard clinical management = 80%