5.3 - Explaining and Classifying Psychological Disorders

Psychological Disorders

What is Abnormal Behavior?

• Deviant: Behavior that violates social norms or expectations.

• Distressful: Causes significant personal distress or discomfort.

• Dysfunctional: Interferes with daily life and functioning.

• Dangerous: Poses a risk of harm to oneself or others.

• Unjustifiable: No rational basis for the behavior.

History of Understanding Psychological Disorders

• Early Treatments: Harsh and often ineffective, including trephination (drilling holes in the skull), exorcism, and confinement.

• The Medical Model: Views mental illness as a disease that can be diagnosed and treated, often with medication and hospitalization.

• The Biopsychosocial Approach: Recognizes that biological, psychological, and social factors all contribute to mental illness.

Perspectives on Psychological Disorders

• Psychoanalytic: Disorders stem from unresolved childhood conflicts and unconscious desires.

• Behavioral: Disorders are learned behaviors, acquired through conditioning and reinforcement.

• Cognitive: Disorders arise from faulty thinking patterns and beliefs.

• Humanistic: Disorders result from a lack of self-worth and conditions of worth placed upon individuals.

• Evolutionary: Proposes that the causes of mental disorders focus on behaviors and mental processes that reduce the likelihood of survival.

• Sociocultural: Disorders are influenced by social and cultural factors, including family dynamics and societal pressures. 

• Biological: Proposes that the causes of mental disorders focus on physiological or genetic issues.

Keep in mind: Diagnosing psychological disorders can have both good and bad effects, depending on the disorder, the person, and factors like cultural norms, stigma, and discrimination.

Classifying and Diagnosing Psychological Disorders

• DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders):

  • Published by the American Psychiatric Association.

  • The most widely used system for classifying and diagnosing mental disorders.

• International Classification of Mental Disorders (ICD):

  • Developed by the World Health Organization (WHO).

  • Another important system used to classify mental disorders globally.

• The Rosenhan Experiment:

  • Demonstrated the challenge of distinguishing between "normal" and "abnormal" behavior in a hospital setting.

  • Raised important questions about the reliability and validity of psychiatric diagnoses.

Most psychologists use an eclectic approach (using more than one psychological perspective) when diagnosing and treating clients.

Diathesis-Stress Model

• Proposes that psychological disorders develop from a combination of genetic vulnerability (diathesis) and stressful life experiences (stress).

• Diathesis: An inherited predisposition that increases the likelihood of a disorder.

• Stress: Environmental factors or life events that trigger or worsen the disorder when combined with the genetic predisposition.