...Disorders Paper II Johnia Sharp Psy/410 March 16, 2013 Rosalyn Davis Pg. 2 Photographic memories stick in people’s minds. Emotions and reactions that cannot be erased and are burned into the memory in one’s mind can have detrimental effects as well as saving someone’s sanity. A simple song or sunset can trigger a person into a rage or to completely withdrawal from society. Post-traumatic stress disorder can break up families that have had the strongest bond and foundation. Post-traumatic stress disorder can affect any age of person ranging from the youngest victims of 9-11 or Hurricane Katrina to soldiers coming home from war. The case of Paul is a heart-wrenching story of a little boy whose world was turned upside-down within the matter of minutes. September 11, 2001 will forever be etched in his mind even if he never speaks on the memory again. In the 3,000 people the United States lost that tragic day, two of those people were Paul’s parents. Before September 11th, Paul’s family had just been another normal family by society’s description. His mother worked in the south tower, which fell first and his father was an assistant chief for the New York City Fire Department (Meyer, Chapman, & Weaver, 2009). Paul was five and his brother, Tom, was in second grade. Three out of five days Paul would go to kindergarten at his school in lower Manhattan, just a block away from the Twin Towers (Meyer, Chapman, & Weaver, 2009). The other two days Paul would go...
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...Abnormal Psychology Roshaun Hatchett PSY/410 April 25, 2012 Dr. Christopher Daub Abnormal Psychology Abnormal psychology has been in existence for more than a century. Mental illness was approached from a spiritual point of view. Individuals of certain beliefs would misdiagnose others from the spiritual perspective and would assume that evil spirits controlled his or her’s physical, mental, and observable world (Tyrer, 2010). The following will be covered in this document: the origins of abnormal psychology, classification of normal and abnormal behaviors, how abnormal psychology evolved into a scientific discipline, and the theoretical models related to the development of abnormal psychology. The practice of trephination, a procedure that bore holes in a individuals skull to release evil spirits, was taken place in 3000 B.C. in Peru and Bolivia (Tyrer, 2010). Hippocrates was the first to approach abnormal behaviors from a biological perspective. He believed, “When the fluids were out of balance, this was the cause of mental illness” (Tyrer, 2010, para. 6). His theory was considered and almost close to the truth, in time his theory was proven to be inaccurate. Years later, Freud suggested the idea of conscious and subconscious processes to be the explanation of odd behaviors. He continued to suggest ideas from a psychodynamic perspective, but in the end lacked evidence in his theory. Freud’s theory inspired Wilhelm Wundt to elaborate on his theory. He...
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...Abnormal Behavior-1 Abnormal Behavior in the Media Donna Scott Ashford University August 27, 20122012 Learning and Assessment for the 21st Century Abnormal Behavior-2 In today’s word Psychologists apply several criteria, individually or in combination, to determine if behavior is abnormal. Based on behavior which is: unusual, socially unacceptable or a violation of a social norm, faulty in the perception or construal of reality, significantly distressing to the individual. Psychological disorders are exhibited throughout all genres of the media industry that is used to store and deliver information or data. For audiences, disturbances of psychological functioning and behavior are so common in the media word today that a disassociation of a serious problem or, an overstatement of facts that occur. In the familiar movie, PSYCHO, the main character, Norman Bates, is a classic example of Hollywood’s description of mental illness. He epitomizes the worst in all that we fear about the mentally ill. Norman exhibits traits that positively match all of the criteria, determining abnormality; although some of his actions could be considered outside of the norm, with regard to several of the said criteria. Explaining these criteria, and how Norman is characterized within the spectrum of this generalization, will describe the positive and negative qualities of the films’ portrayal of mental illness. If I had to choose the mistakes in perceptual psychology between the...
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...Abnormal Psychology Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. It seeks to comprehend people by understanding mental functions and social behavior. It also explores neurobiological and physiological processes that can drive cognitive functions and behaviors. It is this drive to understand mental processes that pushes psychologists to want to learn about what is normal and abnormal behavior. People have tried for thousands of years to understand and define abnormal behavior. In the past 100 years it has undergone “tremendous change, progress, and controversy”(Hansell, J & Damour, L., 2009, p.3). Throughout the modifications certain principles have remained which are known as the core concepts. These core concepts are what define abnormal behavior. There is no clear precise definition for abnormal, which gives rise to challenges in classifying abnormal and normal behavior. Abnormal psychology is a scientific discipline, in which a person acquires information on a person’s behavior and then measures the behavior to hypothesize a cause and treatment. There is a core concept that says that there are multiple causes to abnormal behavior, understanding this can lead to learning about and treating abnormal behavior. These multiple causes can be comprehended by learning about the psychosocial, biological, and sociocultural theoretical models related to the development of abnormal behavior. Abnormal The study of abnormal behavior began early in time when people tried to explain...
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...Historical Perspectives of Abnormal Psychology Abnormal psychology focuses on abnormal behavior, its definition, classifications, explanations, and treatment (Hansell & Damour, 2008). Although its history is merely 100 years old, its story is richly textured. During its evolution, decisions regarding areas of focus evolved into six core concepts that enabled a more accurate definition of the field. To fully understand the scope and significance of contemporary abnormal psychology one must consider psychopathology and its origins, its distinct evolution, and the theoretical models of abnormality, which, in their diversity, attempt to treat those suffering from various disorders. Origins of Abnormal Psychology The relatively young science of abnormal psychology has existed for approximately one hundred years although many forms of mental illness have been recorded throughout history. Stories from biblical times describe suffering similar to contemporary illnesses such as depression and schizophrenia (Bark, 1988; Kahn, 1975, as cited by Hansell & Damour, 2008). One of the earliest known explanations for mental illness in primitive cultures was animism, predicated on belief in the power of the spirit world (Hansell & Damour, 2008). According to this view, mental affliction was associated with possession by an evil or hateful spirit. Archeologists have documented evidence of a treatment called trephination as early as 3000 BCE. This medical procedure consisted...
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...According to Saul McLeod, abnormal behavior is defined as a person’s trait, thinking, or behavior is classified as abnormal if its rare a trait or statistically unusual, (McLeod, Saul (2014) “Abnormal Psychology”). Recently, I was walking in downtown Atlanta and there was a woman who popped out of this walkway, which startled us. Unfortunately, she caused us extreme discomfort since she was screaming at a person (which we didn’t see) and started to come near us but crossed the street eventually to grab something off the ground to come back to where she was at but we were further down the street. The element that can be used to describe the woman is danger which is behavior that can become dangerous to others or oneself by a lack of functioning that is caused by hostility or carelessness that can jeopardize their well being and others as well. Moreover, her behavior would be considered abnormal to me in culture since it disregards the rights of others and can be very disruptive to others. Overall, a limitation could be that it’s functional or adaptive for the individual in their everyday life. Another example of abnormal behavior that has been in the news is Bruce Jenner transitioning to Caitlyn Jenner. Basically, Bruce Jenner didn’t feel that he was meant to be a man anymore and used to try on women’s clothing throughout his life. Once divorced from his wife, he decided to pursue with his deepest desire: to become a woman. Soon, he altered his face and body to appear like a...
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...abnormal psycology Historical Perspectives of Abnormal Psychology Jessica University of Phoenix PSY/410 Facilitator: Maria Neely; MA; M.ed. 19 December 2011 Historical Perspectives of Abnormal Psychology * There is a fine line when comparing normal and abnormal behavior. What appears to be abnormal is considered normal by others. Abnormal behaviors are defined as psychopathology, which relates to abnormal behavior that can be defined, classified, explains, and treated (Hansell & Damour, 2008). This paper will examine the origins of abnormal psychology, include challenges to defining and classifying normal and abnormal behavior, provide a brief overview of how abnormal psychology has evolved into a scientific discipline, and the last part will analyze the psychosocial, biological/medical, and socio-cultural theoretical models related to the development of abnormal psychology. When assessing a person with a mental health problems looking at factors such as feelings, thoughts, and behaviors can play a very important role. The origins of abnormal behavior started...
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...Abnormal Behavior Abnormal psychology is a branch of psychology that studies behaviors, thoughts, and moods that are outside the bounds of what is widely considered as normal in a certain culture. The concept of abnormality is defined differently in different cultures as behaviors of a particular culture may be abnormal to another culture. In order to clearly understand what abnormal psychology is, it is very imperative to first understand what is defined as abnormal. The concept of abnormality is defined in relation to norms of a particular group or culture and hence anything (behavior, thought, or emotion) that is outside the norms of a particular group of people, gender, or age is considered as abnormal. Many people can follow under the normal curve where many human beings are clustered around the highest point of the curve called the average point. Any person who follows far from the average point in the normal curve is considered as abnormal. Different elements of abnormal psychology have brought about differences in definition, approaches, and treatment. These elements include; suffering, adaptation failure, incomprehensibility, vividness, violation of moral and ideal standards, unpredictability and loss of control, and incomprehensibility as well as irrationality. This study indicates how these elements bring about differences in definitions, approaches, and treatment of abnormality. Suffering is generally defined as the aspect of feeling pain or being...
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...PSY/410 - ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY Historical Perspectives of Abnormal Psychology Week 1: Individual Assignment Instructor: Melda Jones May 2011 The earliest account and confirmation of mental illness were the spiritual approach, which originated from the belief that the supernatural or spirits and gods of an unknown realm has an effect on what happens within their earthly domain. This generated a very distinctive way of explaining mental disorders that stem from the physicians of ancient Greece and Rome, yet there were individuals who took a less animistic approach and viewed the behaviors and actions from a biological and scientific aspect (Hansell, 2008). According to the New World Encyclopedia, abnormal psychology is defined as; “a field devoted to the study of causes of mental dysfunctions” (NWE, 2010). Remarkably, this definition as well as many others is indefinite and very vague giving that this field is about 100 years old. The description of what signifies as being abnormal has fluctuated over time as well as cultures. In addition, individuals in society vary in what they may regard as being normal or abnormal behavior. However, throughout the history of this field, decisions on how to define, classify, and explain what abnormal or normal is has been a very difficult task to do. The reason for such difficulty is because of the awareness that defining abnormality creates certain concrete glitches like individuals being...
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...Team C Abnormal Psychology and Therapy Laura Carranza Armanda Meadows Quoc Nguyen Andrea Sanchez Julann Wygal PSY/300 May 8, 2012 Mary Madrigal PhD Abnormal Psychology and Therapy The purpose of this paper is to discuss abnormal psychology and therapy. First this paper will define what abnormal psychology is. Then this paper will compare and contrast normal and abnormal psychology. Then the paper will examine at least two mental disorders from the perspective of psychology. Next the paper will examine two mental illnesses from the perspective of psychology. Finally the paper will discuss the similarities and difference among two different therapies in the schools of thought in psychology for treating mental disorders. Normal and Abnormal Psychology Normal vs. Abnormal Psychology The study of "normal" psychology is simply the study of someone who is in good health both mentally and physically. Said person adheres to and is responsive to social norms, and engages in activities that are socially acceptable and do not stray from the norm. Normal psychology is the study of the mind and the study of behavior. When unusual patterns of behavior, thought and emotion are studied, it falls under the branch of psychology called Abnormal psychology. The control and understanding of behavior that is considered to be deviant or aberrant either statistically or morally, has been the subject of much research and debate. Psychologists who focus on abnormal psychology identify the...
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...portrays beauty as women and men who weigh ninety-five pounds. Due to this current obsession to be skinny in today’s society, many young girls and boys will develop an eating disorder, or turn to drugs and alcohol as a way to escape from the daily pressures to be beautiful in today’s society. This paper will analyze the biological, emotional, cognitive, and behavioral components of eating, substance abuse, sex/gender/sexual, and personality disorders. The DSM-IV-TR includes two axis I categories of eating disorders, anorexia nervosa—restricting and binge-eating/purging types—and bulimia nervosa—purging and non-purging types. Biological factors involved with eating disorders include genetic basis, hormonal excesses and deficiencies and abnormal neural activity. People who suffer from anorexia and bulimia usually have low serotonin levels as well as structural brain abnormalities. High expectations set by parents is a key factor in the emotional aspect of this disorder. Many strive toward high expectations and suffer the effects of not reaching them (Hansell & Damour, 2008). Parents may not realize their behavior towards weight loss has an effect on their children. The reality television show, Toddlers and Tiaras on TLC is an example of how mothers influence their daughters to conform to the current trends of society. A person suffering from an eating disorder will cognitively focus on eating or starvation...
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...Abnormal Psychology Professor Berk In reading the article Positive Psychotherapy many humanistic psychologist developed successful theories and practices that involved human happiness. In informal student and clinical settings the author tested the effects of the intervention for depression by increasing positive emotion, engagement and meaning. Over a period of at least six months a positive psychology exercises compared with a placebo interventions relieved depressive symptoms that last less than a week. According to the PPT study the first study groups significantly decreased levels to mild to moderated depression through a one year follow up. The second PPT delivered to individuals that produce higher remission rates plus medication among other outpatients with major depression disorder. Between both studies treatments for depression may usefully be supplemented by exercise that increases positive emotions, engagement and meaning. PPT rest on the hypothesis that depression can be treated effectively not only by reducing negative symptoms but also directly and primarily building positive emotions, character strength and meaning. According to (Baumeister, Bratslavsky, and Finkenauerd Vohs.2001). The negative quite easily attracts human attention and memory the large literature on “bad is stronger than good. Negative emotions are ties to threat, loss and trespass should trump happiness.PPT have three areas of research; The Pleasant Life: Life of enjoyment...
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...History and Overview of Abnormal Psychology Gary D. Neer PSY/410 March 9th, 2012 Analu Sing History and Overview of Abnormal Psychology The science of abnormal psychology or known as psychopathology tends to be a controversial science. Within this science, there is no simple or direct answer, nor any precise definitions. As with the origin and still today, identifying normal from abnormal behavior is still challenging. However, to understand this science of mystery, one should look into the origin of abnormal psychology; including the challenges in defining what is abnormal psychology and categorizing normal and abnormal behavior, how abnormal psychology evolved, and analyze the psychosocial, biological, and socio-cultural theoretical models related to the development of abnormal psychology to come to a better understanding of abnormal psychology as a discipline. Origin of Abnormal Psychology Abnormal psychology has been a continuous debate throughout history. Psychologists have development many theories trying to explain psychological instability. Generally, history has place abnormal psychology (psychopathology) into three diverse explanations (Barlow & Durand, 2004).The mystical view regards abnormal behavior as a direct result of supernatural possession. Between 1800 B.C. and 1700 B.C, the Hammurabi’s, in the Mesopotamian region, viewed abnormal behavior as the self-possession of gods, ghosts, and spirits, which caused disease in a person’s body or mind (Hornstein...
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...in unconventional ways are easily targeted, this could be dangerous for those who are just following their culture norms and may be persecuted and stigmatized as their labeled mentally ill. When identifying abnormal from normal one must first understand abnormal behaviors and the context in which abnormal behavior falls under three crucial contexts. According to (Hansel, J, & Damour, L, (2008).) One must first understand the circumstances that are correlated within any behavior, which is essential to whether or not the behavior is normal or abnormal. While the field of abnormal psychology is a hundred years old , throughout its history decisions about how to define and classify as well as explain and treat these behaviors that fall under certain discrepancies, as it makes diagnosing easier to understand in an individual who posses abnormal behaviors. Continuum between normal and abnormal is vital to look at especially cultural and historical relativism as well as the advantages and limitations at hand; one must first on the principle of multiple casualties as well as focusing on the connection of the body and mind. (Hansel, J, & Damour, L, (2008).) However while diagnosing a client one must be really careful due to the challenges of diagnosing someone with abnormal behaviors. What makes diagnosing so challenging is that it can be a bit complicated as well as diversely challenging mental disorders that usually involve both precipitating and predisposing causes. While it...
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...of Abnormal Psychology Ann Bacon Psy/410 Abnormal Psychology October 24, 2011 Kristi Lane University of Phoenix Perspectives of Abnormal Psychology What is abnormal psychology? Abnormal psychology is the branch of psychology that deals with behaviors that are not considered normal as well as psychological phenomena such as dreams and altered mental states, which have not been explained. The goal of this branch of psychology is to understand abnormal behavior as well as to determine how and if the behavior needs to be addressed and to develop a treatment plan that will help individuals. This branch of psychology also recognizes that there are many influences such as environmental influences on psychological development. The goal of many mental health professionals is not to force an individual to achieve normality but to help individuals who struggle with mental and emotional disorders to achieve fulfilling and active lives. However, to completely understand what abnormal psychology is we need to understand the origins of abnormal psychology as well as the challenges of defining and classifying normal and abnormal behavior. It is also important to understand how abnormal psychology evolved into a scientific discipline as well as the different viewpoints or models of abnormal psychology. The following paragraphs will hopefully help us to completely understand the branch of abnormal psychology. Origins of Abnormal Psychology The field of abnormal psychology...
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