Psychological Disorders
AP Psychology Chapter 16
Group 3
What is PTSD?
PTSD stands for post-traumatic stress disorder, and are experienced among groups who have experienced
- a natural disaster,
- been in a war
- been kidnapped,
- held captive,
- tortured,
- or raped
Symptoms of PTSD
Intrusive, upsetting memories of the event
Flashbacks (acting or feeling like the event is happening again)
Nightmares (either of the event or of other frightening things)
Feelings of intense distress when reminded of the trauma
Intense physical reactions to reminders of the event
Increased anxiety and emotional arousal
Difficulty falling or staying asleep
Irritability or outbursts of anger
- Difficulty concentrating
Survivor Resiliency: “the positive capacity of people to withstand stressors and to cope with trauma”
understanding life is full of challenges
open, flexible, willing to adapt to change
Internal Locus of Control
they believe they determine their own fate -- their actions determine the outcome of an event or in their life
- “survivor” vs. “victim”
Learning Perspective
Fear Conditioning
General anxiety connected to classical conditioning of fear
Reminders of trauma increases anxiety
Helps explain attentive behaviors
Conditioned fears may outlast our memory, or recollection, of those experiences (i.e. constant falling as infants)
Short list of painful and frightening events can multiply into many human fears
Two specific learning processes contributing to anxiety
Stimulus Generalization - associating conditioned stimulus with similar stimuli
Reinforcement and Compulsive behaviors
Observational Learning
Observing others’ fears.
Human parents’ transmission
Biological Perspective
Natural Selection
Biologically predisposed fear
Modern fears evolved from ancestral fear
- Lack of fear for modern dangers (i.e. guns, bombs)
- Compulsive acts exaggerate behaviors contributing to survival
Genes
- Genetically predisposed fear
- Increased vulnerability to anxiety disorder when afflicted relative is identical twin
- Identical Twins develop similar phobias
The Brain
- Generalized anxiety, panic attacks, and compulsive behaviors are biologically measurable
- Brain scans show increased activity in certain brain areas involving impulse control and habitual behaviors (i.e. anterior cingulate cortex)
- Fear circuits created within amygdala
Dissociative Disorders
What are they?
Symptoms:
- have a sense of being unreal or separated from their body
- Loss of time or memory loss of certain events
- Watching themselves as if in a movie
Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID)
What is it?
Critics of DID
- Are dissociative identities simply a more extreme version of normal human capacity to vary the selves we present.
- Switch personalities when under stress
- Each personality has a distinctive voice and mannerisms and it can seem like there are multiple people talking and living inside your head.
- Also believed to be reinforced by its ability to relieve anxiety.
- Was a rise increase in the 20th century and found is mostly western countries.