Abnormal Psychology: Chapter 1 - Defining Abnormal Behavior

Why is it not enough for a behavior to be rare (statistically deviant) to qualify as a disorder?

In defining abnormality we make value judgments. If something is statistically rare and undesirable (as is severely diminished intellectual functioning), we are more likely to consider it abnormal than something that is statistically rare and highly desirable (such as genius) or something that is undesirable but statistically common (such as rudeness).

What are some downsides of correlational research designs?

Just because two variables are correlated does not tell us anything about why they are correlated. This is true regardless of the size of the correlation. Many research investigations in abnormal psychology reveal that two (or more) things regularly occur together, such as poverty and diminished intellectual development, or depression and reported prior stressors. This in no way affirms that one factor is the cause of the other.

Why can correlational research not be used to show causation?

Just because two variables are correlated does not tell us anything about why they are correlated. This is true regardless of the size of the correlation. Many research investigations in abnormal psychology reveal that two (or more) things regularly occur together, such as poverty and diminished intellectual development, or depression and reported prior stressors. This in no way affirms that one factor is the cause of the other.

What are some downsides of self-report data as a research method in psychopathology?

One problem is that people may not be very good reporters of their own subjective states or experiences. For example, when asked in an interview, one child may report that he has 20 "best friends." Yet, when we observe him, he may always be playing alone. Because people will occasionally lie, misinterpret the question, or desire to present themselves in a particularly favorable (or unfavorable) light, self-report data cannot always be regarded as highly accurate and truthful.

What are some downsides of case studies as a research method in psychopathology?

The information presented in them is subject to bias because the writer of the case study selects what information to include and what information to omit. Another concern is that the material in a case study is often relevant only to the individual being described. This means that the conclusions of a case study have low generalizability—that is, they cannot be used to draw conclusions about other cases even when those cases involve people with a seemingly similar abnormality.

What is a correlation? A positive correlation? A negative correlation?

The researcher selects certain groups of interest (e.g., people who have recently been exposed to a great deal of stress, or people who lost a parent when they were growing up). The researcher would then compare the groups on a variety of different measures (including, in this example, levels of depression). The + sign or ‒ sign indicates the direction of the association between the variables. For example, a positive correlation means that higher scores on one variable are associated with higher scores on the other variable, as might be the case for hours spent studying and grade point average. A negative correlation means that, as scores on one variable go up, scores on the other variable tend to go down. An example here might be the association between hours spent partying and grade point average.

What is the subject of Abnormal Psychology about?

The subject is concerned with understanding the nature, causes, and treatment of mental disorders. Criteria must be met before someone receives a particular diagnosis. This is about family aggregation, which is whether the disorder runs in the family or not. When a clinician first sees a new client or patient, he or she asks many questions to try and understand the issues or problems related to that person. The clinician will also rely on current research to choose the most effective treatment.

What is maladaptiveness?

This interferes with our well-being and with our ability to enjoy our work and our relationships. This behavior is often an indicator of abnormality. The person with anorexia may restrict her intake of food to the point where she becomes so emaciated that she needs to be hospitalized. The person with depression may withdraw from friends and family and may be unable to work for weeks or months.

What are the benefits of direct observational research methods?

When we collect information in a way that does not involve asking people directly (self-report), we are using some form of observational approach. We may also collect information about biological variables (such as heart rate) in our sample of aggressive children. Alternatively, we could collect information about stress hormones, such as cortisol, by asking the observed children to spit into a plastic container (because cortisol is found in saliva). We would then send the saliva samples to the lab for analysis. This, too, is a form of observational data; it tells us something that we want to know using a variable that is relevant to our interests. Technology has advanced, and we are now developing methods to study behaviors, moods, and cognitions that have long been considered inaccessible. We could possibly study the brains of patients with depression directly via brain-imaging approaches. These diverse sources of information would provide us with potentially valuable data, the basis of scientific inquiry.

What does statistical significance mean?

p < .05, This is the level of statistical significance. But what does this mean? Simply put, it means that the probability that the correlation would occur purely by chance is less than 5 out of 100. Researchers adopt this conventional level of significance and consider correlations that have a p < .05 to be statistically significant and worthy of attention . Statistical significance is influenced not only by the magnitude or size of the correlation between the two variables but also by the sample size. A correlation of .30 will not be significant if the sample size is 20 people but will be significant if the sample size is 50 people.

Why is a control group often needed?

Typically, the comparison group is psychologically healthy, or "normal," according to certain specified criteria. We can then compare the two groups on the variables of interest. Example: When a group of patients with schizophrenia (the criterion group or the group of interest) was compared with a group of patients who did not have schizophrenia (the control group), it was clear that there were no differences in milk-drinking between the two groups.

What are some potential downsides ("cons") for using a classification system for disorders?

Using any form of shorthand leads to a loss of information and as we simplify classification, we lose personal details about the actual person who has the disorder. There is a stigma attached with having a psychiatric diagnosis. 'This involves fear that is real or imagined about people thinking they're "nuts"/"crazy." Stigma also deterred people from seeking treatment for mental health problems. Related to stigma, is the problem of stereotyping. Stereotypes are automatic beliefs concerning other people that we unavoidably learn as a result of growing up in a particular culture. Negative behaviors can be associated with psychiatric diagnosis, which is an example of a stereotype. Labeling is a person's self-concept may be directly affected by being given a diagnosis of schizophrenia, depression, or some other form of mental illness.once a group of symptoms is given a name and identified by means of a diagnosis, this diagnostic label can be hard to shake even if the person later makes a full recovery. A person is not their diagnosis and this classifies the disorders that people have.

Why do we need the "dangerousness" of a behavior as part of the definition of abnormality?

We cannot assume that someone diagnosed with a mental disorder must be dangerous. Although people with mental illness do commit serious crimes, serious crimes are also committed every day by people who have no signs of mental disorder. Indeed, research suggests that in people with mental illness, dangerousness is more the exception than the rule.

What is social discomfort?

When someone violates an implicit or unwritten social rule, those around him or her may experience a sense of discomfort or unease. Imagine that you are sitting in an almost empty bus. There are rows of unoccupied seats. Then someone comes in and sits down right next to you. The person is not breaking any formal rule, but your sense of social discomfort ("Why did this person sit right next to me when there are so many empty seats available?") will probably incline you to think that this is an example of abnormal behavior.

How does DSM-5 define abnormal behavior (mental disorders)?

Within DSM-5, a mental disorder is defined as a syndrome that is present in an individual and that involves clinically significant disturbance in behavior, emotion regulation, or cognitive functioning. These disturbances are thought to reflect a dysfunction in biological, psychological, or developmental processes that are necessary for mental functioning.

What is the chief purpose of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5)?

Within DSM-5, a mental disorder is defined as a syndrome that is present in an individual and that involves clinically significant disturbance in behavior, emotion regulation, or cognitive functioning. These disturbances are thought to reflect a dysfunction in biological, psychological, or developmental processes that are necessary for mental functioning. DSM-5 recognizes that mental disorders are usually associated with significant distress or disability in key areas of functioning such as social, occupational, or other activities. The revision process for DSM-5 had the goals of maintaining continuity with the previous edition (DSM-IV) as well as being guided by new research findings. The DSM-5 definition of mental illness was based on input from various DSM-5 work groups as well as other sources.

What are Violations of the Standards of Society?

A behavior is most likely to be viewed as abnormal when it violates the standards of society and is statistically deviant or rare. When people fail to follow the conventional social and moral rules of their cultural group, we may consider their behavior abnormal. For example, driving a car or watching television would be considered highly abnormal for the Amish of Pennsylvania. However, both of these activities reflect normal everyday behavior for most other Pennsylvania residents.

What is meta-analysis?

A meta-analysis is a statistical approach that calculates and then combines the effect sizes from all of the studies. Within a meta-analysis, each separate study can be thought of as being equivalent to an individual participant in a conventional research design.

What is irrationality and unpredictability?

As we have already noted, we expect people to behave in certain ways. If a person sitting next to you suddenly began to scream and yell obscenities at nothing, you would probably regard that behavior as abnormal. It would be unpredictable, and it would make no sense to you. The disordered speech and the disorganized behavior of patients with schizophrenia are often irrational.

What is a nomenclature for disorders?

At the most fundamental level, classification systems provide us with a naming system. This gives clinicians and researchers both a common language and shorthand terms for complex clinical conditions. Without having a common set of terms to describe specific clinical conditions, clinicians would have to talk at length about each patient individually to provide an overview of the patient's problems.

What is valuable about prospective research as compared to retrospective research methods?

In prospective research the idea is to identify individuals who have a higher-than-average likelihood of becoming psychologically disordered and to focus research attention on them before any disorder manifests. We can have much more confidence in our hypotheses about the causes of a disorder if we have been tracking influences and measuring them prior to the development of the illness in question. For retrospective research we would try to collect information about how the patients behaved early in their lives with the goal of identifying factors that might have been associated with what went wrong later.

What does the epidemiology of disorders refer to?

Mental health epidemiology is the study of the distribution of mental disorders. A key component of an epidemiological survey is determining the frequencies of mental disorders.

What does comorbidity refer to?

Comorbidity is the term used to describe the presence of two or more disorders in the same person. Comorbidity is especially high in people who have severe forms of mental disorders.

What does external validity refer to?

From a research perspective, the more representative our sample is, the better able we are to generalize (or extend the findings from our study) to the larger group. The extent to which we can generalize our findings beyond the study itself is called external validity. A research study that involves both males and females from all age groups, income levels, and educational levels is more representative of the underlying population (and will have greater external validity) than research using only female college students, for example.

Why is it useful to understand patterns of comorbidity between disorders?

Half of the individuals with a disorder rated as serious on a scale of severity (mild, moderate, and serious) had two or more additional disorders. An illustration of this would be a person who drinks excessively and who is simultaneously depressed and suffering from an anxiety disorder. What this indicates is that comorbidity is much more likely to occur in people who have the most serious forms of mental disorders. When the condition is mild, comorbidity is the exception rather than the rule.

What is subjective distress?

If people suffer or experience psychological pain we are inclined to consider this as indicative of abnormality. But what of the patient who is manic and whose mood is one of elation? He or she may not be experiencing any distress. In fact, many such patients dislike taking medications because they do not want to lose their manic "highs."Although, it is an element of abnormality in many cases, it is neither a sufficient condition (all that is needed) nor even a necessary condition (a feature that all cases of abnormality must show) for us to consider something as abnormal.

What is statistical deviance?

Intellectual disability (which is statistically rare and represents a deviation from normal) is considered to reflect abnormality. This tells us that in defining abnormality we make value judgments. If something is statistically rare and undesirable (as is severely diminished intellectual functioning), we are more likely to consider it abnormal than something that is statistically rare and highly desirable (such as genius) or something that is undesirable but statistically common (such as rudeness).

What does internal validity refer to?

Internal validity reflects how confident we can be in the results of a particular given study. In other words, internal validity is the extent to which a study is methodologically sound, free of confounds or other sources of error, and able to be used to draw valid conclusions.

What are the two hallmarks of disordered behavior—the two typically most prominent features of disordered behavior?

Irrationality and unpredictability. The disordered speech and the disorganized behavior of patients with schizophrenia are often irrational. Such behaviors are also a hallmark of the manic phases of bipolar disorder.

What are some "pros" for using a classification system (nomenclature)?

It gives both a common language and shorthand terms for complex clinical conditions, enables us to structure information in a more helpful way, classification facilitates research that gives us more info and understanding, and defines the domain of what is considered to be pathological to establish the range of problems that a mental health professional can address.

What is a hypothesis?

It is an effort to explain, predict, or explore something. What distinguishes scientific hypotheses from the vague speculation that we all routinely engage in is that scientists attempt to test their hypotheses. In other words, they try to design research studies that will help them approach a fuller understanding of how and why things happen.

What is dangerousness?

It seems quite reasonable to think that someone who is a danger to him- or herself or to another person must be psychologically abnormal. therapists are required to hospitalize suicidal clients or contact the police (as well as the person who is the target of the threat) if they have a client who makes an explicit threat to harm another person.

Which disorders are associated with the greatest public health burden as measured by disability-adjusted life years?

Mental and substance use disorders are often disabling conditions. Worldwide, they account for over 7 percent of the global burden of disease.

Why does behavior that only violates social standards (and is not impairing or distressing, for example) not qualify as abnormal?

Much depends on the magnitude of the violation and on how commonly the rule is violated by others. Most of us have parked illegally at some point. This failure to follow the rules is so statistically common that we tend not to think of it as abnormal. Yet when a mother drowns her children there is instant recognition that this is abnormal behavior.

What is the difference between point prevalence and lifetime prevalence of disorders?

Point prevalence refers to the estimated proportion of actual, active cases of a disorder in a given population at a given point in time. For example, if we were to conduct a study and count the number of people who have major depressive disorder (i.e., clinical depression) on January 1 of next year, this would provide us with a point prevalence estimate of active cases of depression. We may wish to obtain an estimate of the number of people who have had a particular disorder at any time in their lives (even if they are now recovered). This would provide us with a lifetime prevalence. Because they extend over an entire lifetime and include both currently ill and recovered individuals, lifetime prevalence estimates tend to be higher than other kinds of prevalence estimates.

Is it simple to define what behavior is considered abnormal and what is normal?

There is still no universal agreement about what is meant by abnormality or disorder. This is not to say we do not have definitions; we do. A major problem is that there is no one behavior that makes someone abnormal. However, there are some clear elements or indicators of abnormality.