Module 48 Mr. Ng Abnormal Psychology Unit 13. Anxiety Disorders Anxiety Disorder: Distressing, persistent anxiety or maladaptive behaviors that reduce.
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Module 48Mr. Ng
Abnormal PsychologyUnit 13
Anxiety Disorders
• Anxiety Disorder: Distressing, persistent anxiety or maladaptive behaviors that reduce anxiety.
• Anxiety is a feeling of impending doom or disaster characterized by:–Mood symptoms: tension, agitation, etc.–Bodily symptoms: sweating, increased
heart rate, muscular tension, etc.–Cognitive symptoms: worry, distractibility
Anxiety Disorders
• We will look at: –Panic Disorder–Generalized anxiety disorder–Phobias–Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
Anxiety Disorders
• Panic Disorder: when an individual experiences repeated attacks of intense anxiety, along with:–severe chest pain–tightness of muscles–choking–feeling light-headed or faint–profuse sweating–clammy hands
• Symptoms can last for a few minutes to a couple of hours
• Panic attacks have no apparent trigger and can happen at any time
• Since they are statistically rare, having perhaps 3 of these in a 6-month period would be cause for alarm.
Anxiety Disorders
• Generalized Anxiety Disorder: a person is unexplainable and continually tense and uneasy.
• Similar to panic disorder.• Panic disorder has acute symptoms
short in duration, whereas generalized anxiety disorder has less-intense symptoms for a longer period of time.
Anxiety Disorders
• Phobias: intense, irrational fear and avoidance of a specific object or situation.–5% of the population suffers from
some mild form of phobic disorder.–A fear turns into a phobia when a
compelling, irrational desire to avoid a dreaded situation or object, disrupts the person’s daily life.
Anxiety Disorders
• Common phobias include:–Agoraphobia: fear of being out in public–Acrophobia: fear of heights–Claustrophobia: fear of enclosed spaces–Social Phobia: fear of being scrutinized by others (extreme shyness).
Anxiety Disorders
• Obsessive-compulsive Disorder (OCD): unwanted repetitive thoughts (obsessions) and/or actions (compulsions) that you feel compelled to perform.
• A person who has OCD probably knows they have it, but feels unable to resist their compulsions and break free.
Anxiety Disorders
• Obsession: persistent, intrusive, and unwanted thoughts that an individual cannot get out of his/her mind.–Different from worries; they
generally involve a unique topic (e.g. dirt, contamination, death, aggression), are often offensive, and are seen as uncontrollable.
Anxiety Disorders
• Compulsion: ritualistic behaviors performed repeatedly, which the person does to reduce the tension created by the obsession. –Common compulsions: hand washing, counting, checking, touching.
Anxiety Disorders
• Most people with OCD are either:–Washers: afraid of contamination.–Checkers: repeatedly check things
they associate with harm or danger.–Doubters: afraid if everything isn’t
perfect something terrible will happen.–Counters: obsessed with order and
symmetry.–Hoarders: fear something bad will
happen if they throw anything away.
Anxiety Disorders
• Example of OCD: a person thinks about germs all the time and washes their hands three times in a row every time they pass a sink.
• You may check the stove 20 times to make sure its off.
• Hoarders
Anxiety Disorders
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD): The result of some trauma experienced (natural disaster, war, violent crime) by the victim.
• Characterized by haunting memories, nightmares, social withdrawal, jumpy anxiety, and/or insomnia that lingers for 4 or more weeks after a traumatic experience.
Anxiety Disorders
• Victims re-experience the traumatic event in nightmares about the event, or flashbacks in which the individual relives the event and behaves as if he/she is experiencing at that moment.
• Victims may also experience reduced involvement with the external world, and general arousal characterized by hyper-alertness, guilt, and difficulty concentrating.
Anxiety Disorders
The Learning Perspective• Fear Conditioning: Anxiety develops
when bad events happen. • We are classically conditioned to
fear when we experience bad things.• Observational learning: acquiring
fears by observing others’ fears.• We transmit fears just as if we
experienced them ourselves.
Explaining Anxiety Disorders
The Biological Perspective• Natural Selection: We fear things
that were dangerous to our ancestors. Those that did not fear those things died from them and thus their genes were not passed on.
• Ex. Some snakes are poisonous and thus were feared by ancestors and now are feared by us.
Explaining Anxiety Disorders
• Genes: We inherit traits that are predisposed to certain fears and high anxiety.
• Ex. Twins develop similar phobias.• Brain: Certain regions of our brains
are over aroused. Those regions are involved in impulse control and habitual behaviors.
Explaining Anxiety Disorders
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