Introduction to Abnormal Psychology (doc)

Running Head: Abnormal Psychology
Abnormal Psychology
Social Anxiety

Abnormal Psychology
Abstract
Social Anxiety Disorder is one of the very common disorders in which people feel shy or
have fear to talk in public. They feel anxious and depressed and want to be left alone. This
type of disorder can prove to be harmful for people and to treat this disorder; there have been
experiments done with pharmacological and CBT treatments. CBT proved to be one of the
best treatments for such type of disorders. This essay covers all these details as well as
Sociocultural, Physiological and Biological aspects are also discussed with the future
recommendations to cure such type of disorders.
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Abnormal Psychology
Abnormal psychology is the study of the unique patterns of thoughts, behaviours and
emotions which might or might not be assumed as triggering of a mental disorder. However,
there are so many behaviours which can be considered as abnormal. This branch of
psychology factually deals with the behaviour in the clinical context (Sommers, Curtin, &
Newman, 2013). There have been histories related to such a topic to understand this
behaviour and mainly cultural difference approach is followed. There are multiple reasons for
the causes of the conditions which are very different form each other with the help of the
various theories of psychology which studies about being abnormal. There is a divide done in
between the psychological and the biological conditions which reflect the dualism of the
philosophy with respect to mind and body problems (Nusslock, Shackman, Jones, Alloy, &
Coan, 2011). There are various approaches which tries to classify the mental disorders. The
categories of the abnormal are: Subnormal, paranormal and supernormal.
There are generally two types of the behaviours seen in psychology of abnormality. They are
adaptive and maladaptive. Maladaptive behaviour tells that there is undoubtedly some
problem which exists which means that the human being is vulnerable and is unable to cope
with the stress in the environment. This leads to problems in the functioning of daily life in a
normal way (Franklin, Hessel, Aaron, & Arthur, 2010). Abnormal psychology is the
backdrop of the clinical psychology but clinical psychologists do not necessarily use the term
“Abnormal” in their practice. This term is majorly used in the field of psychiatry which is the
study of brain. In these abnormalities, there are various disorders which are studied in details
like social anxiety, schizophrenia etc.
Social Anxiety Disorder
There are many human beings who experience harsh social phobia and anxiety. In this
process they feel that they are being observed by the public or other people and they become
afraid of socializing with other human beings (Heeren & McNally, 2016). Social anxiety
disorder is very common now days. It can become very discouraging for the people who have
it as this leads to depression in case if those people are not properly behaved with or not
properly treated. Person with social anxiety disorder can go in depression if they are not
given a proper treatment. Skills for socializing are considered to be very important and vital
as people have to adjust according to the society and functioning of it irrespective of the
problems they are going through.
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Abnormal Psychology
Most people become anxious while talking in public, giving presentation, or giving a job
interview. When people feel this anxiety, they tend to have sweaty palms, heart pounding,
and butterflies in the stomach etc. There are people in America, approximately 15 million
who face this disorder and face a deep fear of having negatively evaluated by others in social
situations (Schneier, 2003). However, people realize that fear is extreme. This disorder is also
known as Social Phobia. Such people become powerless when anxiety hits them. Many
people have this belief that abnormality means being different from others or one can say the
society will not take it in a normal way.
Causes of Social Anxiety
There are some causes due to which social anxiety develops in the human beings. They are:
Genetics: Sometimes this disorder comes in a human being from his family.
Traumatic Events: In case if the person has gone through some physical and mental abuse,
they will feel this disorder.
Social Skills: If an individual is not confident enough then he will face problems in dealing
with people in public.
Brain Structure: Sometimes, the brain regulates the fear and anxiety in abnormal way when
not needed. Due to this regulation, this disorder generates.
Family History: Parents which are overly protective for their kids, or over anxious might
make their children prone to social anxiety (Cruz, Martins, & Rejane Beserr, 2017).
Symptoms of Social Anxiety
The behaviour of people will always change if they are not acting normal or feeling normal.
While the social anxiety disorder takes place, individuals will not feel comfortable in talking
to others, will feel self conscious, will have difficulty in making friends, will dodge face to
face interactions, and will start taking drugs to ease the pain (Angélico, Crippa, & Loureiro,
2013).
Behavioural Aspects of Social Anxiety Disorder
Most of the times, the cognitive and behavioural models of anxiety are linked together. Yet
the supporters of every perspective always tend to focus on various variables in the
theories.The philosophers, who study the behaviours of the human beings in psychology,
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Abnormal Psychology
usually focus on the experiences they get from the learnings which consists of the vintage and
operant conditioning that moves ahead to the development of the fear (Henderson, Gilbert, &
Zimbardo, 2014).
According to Mower (1960), in his two stage model of the growth of fear and maintenance,
fear will always begin with the classical conditioning of the event. In this conditioning, the
object is linked with some absolutely hated moment for that object in order to generate the
fear in that object. After then the fear is maintained by the operant conditioning in which the
behaviour of avoidance will help the fear to decrease (L. Rodebaugh, Heimberg, Taylor, &
Lenze, 2016).
Rachman in the year 1976 and 1977 opposed this view on the grounds that most of the human
beings with this disorder never recalled any kind of conditioning when they faced the event
which led to disorder. Later he also proposed that conditioning could be one cause but due to
shock too, phobia can generate in individuals. Model that Rachman gave was considered to
be the example of that theory which combines learning and cognitive processes (Cederlund,
2013). Theorists of cognitive psychology focus on the significance of the beliefs, predictions
and cognitive biases in the growth and the preservation of the disorders. The best cognitive
model in terms of anxiety disorders is of David Clark’s which he gave in the year of 1986 and
1988.
Clark said that the panic attacks which are unexpected by the individuals, they are triggered
because of the occurrence of the sensations which the individuals feel physically. Such panic
attacks are usually misinterpreted by the human beings with the indication of immediate
threat. When this is misinterpreted, it leads to more anxiety. This will lead to more of the
sensational feeling in body and more interpretations are made. In a fraction of seconds, that
mild physical arousal becomes panic attack.
Study of Cognitive Theories
CBT Vs Support Therapy: There was a research done on a group of people who met the
DSM-III criteria of the social anxiety disorder. Heimberg in the year 1994 did the comparison
between the 12 sessions of the group CBT that included cognitive strategies and exposure
with the group of people who received education and support (Argembeau, Linden, Etienne,
& Comblain, 2003). With the usage of the clinical ratings, the results were assessed and also
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Abnormal Psychology
behavioural, physiological and cognitive assessments. Both of the groups were improved on
most of the measures although the one with CBT was rated as improved to a much more
extent than the other one and was reported with less anxiety during the test. Even after 6
months of follow up, results were the same as before. People with CBT were more improved
than the other ones.
Hofman, Newman and Roth & Taylor in the year 1994 researched on the effectiveness of the
exposure therapy with no cognitive interventions. There were 36 individuals with social
anxiety who said that they had a fear of speaking in public. 8 weekly sessions were given to
all those participants where exposure therapy was given. There was another group known as
waitlist control group. The ones who got the exposure therapy faced so many changes in
terms of the behaviour, subjective and cognitive anxiety (Washburn, Wilson, Roes, Rnic, &
Harkness, 2016).
CBT and Pharmacological Treatments
Turner, Beidel and Jacob in 1994 researched on the three months of behavioural therapy by
giving them medicines like atenolol and placebo to 72 patients in total who met the criteria of
social anxiety disorder. Flooding is a part of the behaviour therapy which was given here in
this experiment. If placebo and flooding is considered, flooding was considered better.
Atenolol was not at all considered good. 88.9% of people were cured from the therapy of
exposure, 46.6% from atenolol and 43.8% from the placebo. After the six months follow up,
people who were improved maintained their gains (Smits, Rosenfield, McDonald, & Telch,
2006).
Another experiment was done by Gelernter in 1991. 65 patients who had social anxiety were
assigned to four 12week treatment of CBT, Phenelzine and self-exposure instructions,
alprazolam and placebo. All the groups improved after the treatment. When the scoring was
done, 63% for Phenelzine, 38% for alprazolam, 24% of CBT and 20% of placebo came out. It
turned out Phenelzine was better than CBT in improving the condition of the individuals.
Hence, Phenelzine and CBT patients were followed up for six months. After six months,
Phenelzine patients relapsed while people who were treated with CBT maintained their gains.
Later by more researchers, a lot of tests in the similar way were done (Mitte, 2005). At last,
one could say that there are evidences through which it was proved that CBT is an effective
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Abnormal Psychology
treatment for social anxiety disorder. CBT proves to be successful as compared to supportive
therapy, placebo and other treatments. Hence, a conclusion could be made that
pharmacological approaches are good for short term treatments but for a long term goal, CBT
is to be used.
Psychological Models of social anxiety
A general model of psychology of mental disorder suggests that social, biological and other
circumstances casually operate by disturbing the psychological process.
Psychological Process
The central point where all the disruptions happen is shown in the figure. The approaches of
psychology have separated actual events from the understating of the events. This model
displays neatly differentiated events from psychological processes which understand, buffer
and act eventually on such events (Chouhan & Sharma, 2017). This model tries to refer to the
interactions in between the classes of casual variables. All factors such as biological, social
and situational are significant and are presumed to interact. It is actually the combined effect
of the interacting factors on these psychological processes which leads to the disorders.
This model is not only developed to imply that the cliché symptoms of psychiatric
classifications are psychological but also that the psychological processes or dysfunctions
have their hand in shaping the nature, extent and type of phenomena which is usually
developed in the disorders. If seen in bio psychological model, there are many of the casual
factors which are implicated. For example: In depression, few casual factors might be salient
and few psychological processes might be linked (Kemp & Felmingham, 2008). It is always
likely to theorize that deprivation from social factors, childhood ill-treatment, genetic pain,
biochemical insults are the factors which combining all can help in the development of the
mental disorder or depression.
All such factors might impose on psychological factors processes such as self-respect beliefs
in self efficacy and hopes of reward. Depression which is shown in the model is depicted
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Abnormal Psychology
asthe direct result and neither of neuroanatomical mechanisms and also does not contribute to
social and situational factors. It is the disruptions of these processes that ultimately lead to the
mental disorder and sometimes depression (Seekles, Cuijpers, Kok, & Straten, 2012).
Biological models of social anxiety
Neuroscience has occupied the major role in mental health as it validly reveals the links to the
development of mental disorders. Neuroscience’s objective is to do the finding on the
biological determination for the phenomena of the mental disorders. When the development
on this research was done, genetic heritance and brain psychology were seen as the bottom
core of such type of illnesses (Lebowitz, Pyun, & kyoung, 2014).
Genetic Inheritance
One of the major objectives of the biological psychiatry was to identify the gene or the set of
genes so that pathological mental process could be taken care of. For years and years, it was
always felt that ignoring the disorder etiology would finally be conquered as the technology
progresses and it will result in the research possibilities. When advanced genetic research
techniques were developed, the identification of the gene was made possible. In Human
Genome project, the objective was to identify the individual’s body architecture of genetics
for identifying the relation between the inheritance genetics and the diseases emergence. The
development of the effective therapeutic and preventive interventions was done then
(Norrholm S. D., 2009). Studies are done on the findings of the genes for the disorders like
schizophrenia, autism and bipolar disorder etc.
In terms of biology, epigenetic is the term which corresponds to the modification of the
gene’s expression. In other words, it is actually a modification of the results produced in the
organism which is based on the upregulation of the gene. The effects of this refer to the
development of the proteins which are based on the information that is contained in every
segment of the DNA. It is also accountable for the metabolic effects which are developed in
organism and hence in the formation of the phenotypes. Down regulation and up regulation
of gene is very common in the development with the help of which cell are able to
differentiate during the embryonic process and then they easily develop the characteristics in
every tissue and organ of the human body (Norrholm & Ressler, 2009).
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Abnormal Psychology
The Developing brain
The impression of the epigenetic is linked with the neurodevelopment and plasticity of brain
in neuroscience. In opposition to the description of brain which works as an isolated
information processor, the present model points towards the multiplicity of connections and
underlying in determination in development of brain and it’s functioning. This is the situation
when mental disorders are defined as neuro developmental disorders and they are looked
upon as the final state of abnormal process in the development of the brain (Martin, Ressier,
Binder, & Nummeroff, 2013). These are the processes which occur in the critical situations
during the development of the individual and leads to the functional modifications such as
behavioural alterations and cognitive deficits etc.
Socioculture Model of Social Anxiety
The Socioculture approach can be defined as the method that makes and defines the
individuals. This approach focuses on the influence of the society that individual live in. The
cultural factors such as art, language, norms or social structures play an important role in the
growth of the cognitive abilities. Sociocultural approach has one model which is known as
Bifold model (Mechanic, 1975).
The Bifold Model
There have been many studies which have taken a further approach of sociocultural model of
social anxiety. The working of the approach could be displayed by doing the comparison of
the human memory and the memory of the animal. The memory of the animal is reactionary.
For example: A mouse always will live in the present and it only links itself with the object
that it sees at that moment. The mind of the animal will never be able to unlock the
experiences independent of the moment it experienced at that moment. Hence, the mouse can
realize and recognize the predator when approached by one and act according to the situation
but it would never recall the predator like snake or anything. Language gives the capability to
human beings to recall experiences with not having being first hand. Human being can see
the watermelon and will recall what it is but also recalls the taste of it and also the memory of
having one earlier. Similarly, any shocking incident if happened with the human being will be
recalled at the time of fear or darkness etc.
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Abnormal Psychology
Directions for the Future Research
There are some of the recommendation on the basis of the research of anxiety disorders that
is done till now. Based on the findings of the research, here are some recommendations for
the treatment of such disorders:
 There is more of the longitudinal research with the usage of the multidimensional
approach is needed for risks of the development of the anxiety disorders. There are
actually not many studies done on the role of the protection factors which can
decrease the development of the social anxiety disorders (Shodhganga, 2018).
 The research that is to be done in the future should be more controlled with the
inclusion of the Meta analytic studies. The combination of the pharmacological and
psychological treatments should be done even more.
 Researches should be strong methodologically for the effectiveness of the
psychotherapeutic approaches.
 Researches that explore treatment sequencing are needed when combined treatments
are used.
 The follow up of the treatments should be done for the long term so that efficacy over
time is measured.
 Antidepressant medications in the treatment should be evaluated and for a controlled
research should be done.
 The studies of the treatment should always involve a wider range of the outcome
variables like effect of anxiety disorder on the life’s quality etc.
 The self-help treatments for the anxiety disorders should be conducted more and
should be researched on further (Antony & Stein, 2012).
Conclusion
This essay focuses on the psychology of abnormality. There are many abnormalities which a
person deals with in life but out of them all the most common disorder is social anxiety. This
type of disorder occurs in almost everybody but to some people it is deep and depressing. The
definition of the social anxiety disorder is explained in this essay with the treatments that
were done for curing of such disorders. Out of all the treatments, CBT is one of the most
essential and successful treatment of all other treatments. There were researches done by the
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Abnormal Psychology
scientists where a few more pharma doses were given to the people who had anxiety disorder
with CBT. Evidence proves that CBT is a cure for such type of disorders and it is good for
long term. The biological, Socioculture and psychological models of the mental disorders are
also emphasized in order to study more about abnormal psychology.
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Abnormal Psychology
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