Controlling Impulses

I was reading an article recently, and it mentioned something called Trichotillomania. I was super confused by what this long name stood for. Lo and behold, it has to do with Psychology. Trichotillomania is a disorder where people have a compulsive urge to pull out their hair. It can be triggered by stress or depression, and is classified as an impulse control disorder.

What is an impulse control disorder? Well, it's something our book didn't really focus on, perhaps because the DSM 5 is the edition that goes into detail about them. Basically, Impulse control disorders are psychiatric disorders (treated with medication) that are characterized by impulsiveness (of behavior or emotion), and not being able to resist temptations or urges that can be harmful to oneself or others. Not ring a bell? Some things that are classified as Impulse control disorders are Schizophrenia, substance-related disorders, ADHD, antisocial personality disorder, and mood disorders. It also covers a spectrum called Impulse-control disorders not otherwise specified, which includes things like kleptomania and pyromania.

Have you ever heard someone state that they "aren't able to control themselves?" If it's said in earnest, that's the sign of an addiction or an obsession- it's a warning word meaning that there is a real problem. This is the disorder behind all that. This can even explain over-gamblers, compulsive shoppers and eaters, internet and technology addictions, and more. The key here is the  obsessions and compulsions, with a focus on the latter.

Thankfully, most things that fall under this category can be treated to some extent. There are medications that can help. Anti-anxiety medications and antidepressants are the most common. Also, Cognitive Behavioral therapy plays a key role in most Impulse control disorders, because they can be somewhat cognitive. The patient must be willing to go along with the therapy. With this kind of disorder, their agreement can be hard to obtain. I think it's interesting that all these disorders have a common element, because they seem unrelated on the surface.

The Lego Movie

 Over Pesach break, I was taken against my will to see the Lego movie (courtesy of my little brother). Even though this is rated one of the best movies ever, or something along the lines of that, I don't get the craze. The plot kind of ties up at the very end, but everything in between is pretty much the weirdest explosion of insanity that I've ever laid eyes on. However, there were some interesting Psychological themes throughout the movie. Here is what stood out to me, scene by scene:

- At the beginning, there are rules for everything, and it's a kind've mob-psychology/Stockholm syndrome/ propoganda/ obedience mix. There are rules for everything and people don't even consider going against them. I guess they got used to them and now enjoy them? They also follow rules just because authoritative people say to do them.There is this Lord Business guy who is the ruler of everyone and controls basically the entire everything. He also convinces everyone to follow him. Every single person sings what appears to be the only song in existence, "Everything is Awesome." It's reminiscent of totalitarianism with a twist that includes a "Taco Tuesday."

ADHD to the max: I don't know who made this, or what state of mind they were in, but much of this movie seems like it was generated from the mind of an 8 year old, hyperactive, Lego-loving boy (like my brother.) It all over the place. The way they brought things together was funny at times, but I left that movie slack-jawed and in shock, with only one question in mind: WHY?!!!

The struggle of being in a group: The main character's whole transformation is from a common nobody to realizing that everyone is special and can stand out in a group. His own ideas were silenced and he was totally under huge pressure to coform- conformity was the lifestyle. Deindividuation was the only possibility until he learned otherwise. So much groupthink...

All in all, it was an interesting experience. I hope you find these insights enlightening and the clips interesting (I think that's the safest description...).

Social Psychology - Follow for more relatable teen posts!!!!

Hiya, kids!
As we've been learning all about psychology, I've found myself recognizing these psychological concepts when they occur in my life. Above all, chapter 14 is by far the most relatable chapter. All this stuff really does happen!! I guess someone decided one day to give names to all these phenomena so that a bunch of students would have to memorize them for their AP Psychology exam one day.

Let's take social loafing for example. I loaf all the time!!! I am loaf. Loaf is me. Sometimes I'll be working on a collective Google doc and suddenly find myself scrolling through Buzzfeed because I just assume someone else in the group is doing something productive. Then I usually feel bad and get back on track. But really, happens all the time.

Another concept that is just like "yaaaas" is the fundamental attribution error. I definitely fall prey to this sometimes. Especially if it's a person I don't particularly like very much. If they do something annoying, I'll usually think, "Ughhh, they're just the worst," even if it's a little unfair to think that way. What's interesting, though, is that if one of my friends were to do the same annoying thing I would probably brush it aside and soon forget about it. Which kind of ties into ingroup bias, because of course my friends are better/smarter/more likeable than your friends and can really do no wrong.

It's crazy to me how complex social psychology is. Our interactions with others can be so biased and honestly kind of mean. The human race can be such a female dog. There's such a strange system to everything social. It's weird to think about how affected we are by the people around us. Kinda makes you want to live in isolation sometimes, doesn't it? I don't know if I'm making any sense or if this is just one of those situations where it's hard to put my mind-boggling thoughts into words and y'all are probably thinking "Okay, Lily, stop typing already" so I'll stop. Thanks for reading! Don't loaf too hard.

Bystander Effect

As I was scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed I stumbled across a video that I thought would relate  to exactly what we are learning about in class. In class, we learned about the bystander effect - people feel that since there are more people around, more people will help. 

We learned about the case of Kitty Genovese and how she was being raped and murdered in the middle of New York city, and everyone thought someone else was going to help her since there were other people around. The people in their apartment buildings could have heard her, but they thought the other people in the apartment buildings would have helped her. No one helped her until it was too late and she had fatal wounds. 

When I first started watching this video, I thought it was going to be exactly Kitty Genovese's case where since there are so many people around no one will help out and the bystander effect will occur. To my surprise, I was wrong. At first, the people who saw the young boy freezing, just stood there and did nothing. After a while, they began to notice him and they began to take responsibility and give him clothes off their back and giving it to the boy so that he could stay warm. 

ADHD: What is it like?

Before Pesach, my I came across my dad reading an article about ADHD and many people say they have it, but really don't. Long story short, this article explains exactly what ADHD is. I thought this was appropriate because we can clear up a commonly mistaken disorder, like Mrs. Perl urges us to do.

According to this article, ADHD is about having disrupted filters in one's perception. Majority of people have the ability to take in bunches of information and filter through it, only keeping what is absolutely necessary. It is described as being able to keep their mental white board organized/clean at all times. However, people with ADHD cannot keep their mental board organized/clean because their filters are broken that organize through what is necessary. To go along with the white board metaphor, every single thought that crosses their mind is written in bold and underlined on their mental white board.

The article also explains that people with ADHD focus a lot on their routine. For another metaphor, they are stuck on autopilot 90% of the time. It is hard for people with ADHD to get distracted from their routine unless someone physically interrupts the routine.

Many people also only associate the attention part of ADHD with ADD, but ADHD has a lot attention problems on its own. The article explains that the internet is like "crack" to people with ADHD because it is a sea of constantly moving, new objects at a simple click of a button.

The last thing that the article describes is that medicine does help with ignoring the trivial distractions and maximizing focus ability.

I really do hope that this helps you realize what it is like to have ADHD, but my question for all of you is, DO YOU THINK THAT UNDERLYING THIS DISORDER IS ANXIETY OR ANOTHER PSYCHOLOGICAL PRINCIPLE?

http://www.tickld.com/x/if-your-friends-ever-say-they-have-adhd-just-show-them-this

The Pygmalion Effect: The King's Speech Epitomized

As we were learning about social psychology, we learned a lot of technical names and explanations for things that we see throughout our lives. One such example of this is the Pygmalion effect, one form of self-fulfilling prophecy. The quizlet definition of this effect is the effect of teacher's expectations on students. For example, if a student is in an advanced class, and the teacher treats and approaches the students as if they're gifted, then the students will tend to do better than they would in a remedial class where the teacher treats them as if there's something wrong. As always, this got me thinking about movies that I've seen this effect in. Most notably, it made me think about "The King's Speech."

For those that haven't seen this Oscar-winning movie of awesomeness, it's about a man, Bertie, who happens to be a prince and happens to have a horrible stutter. As the Duke of York, he has to make a few short speeches and seeks speech therapy from decorated doctors who, sadly, give him the worst advice. One doctor tries to make him speak with seven marbles stuck in his mouth because the stammer must be because of a problem in his mouth. Another doctor tells him to smoke, and for no clear purpose at that. Then comes Lionel Logue: a thespian, an Australian, and an unaccredited speech therapist. As you probably could have guessed, Lionel manages to help Bertie with his stutter. When Bertie is forced into taking the throne on the eve of World War II, Lionel is there with him to help him through his most difficult speech, which he succeeds at delivering. Here's the video so you can judge for yourself:

What's most interesting about this movie is the stark contrast between the former doctors and Lionel. All of the nighted doctors treated Bertie as if there were something fundamentally wrong with him that needed to be mended. Lionel, on the other hand, treated Bertie like an equal and helped him overcome one of the greatest challenges of his life by treating him like a man with a voice. Throughout the movie, Lionel makes Bertie say "I have a right to be heard! I have a voice!" With this statement, Lionel gives Bertie the confidence to overcome his stammer and fulfill the self-fulfilling prophecy. This whole scenario adds something to the pygmalion effect: the teacher who treats their students as equals with a right to be heard will get the best results.

On that note, we should all thank Mrs. Perl for treating us all as if we have a right to be heard and not doubting us, even when we turn in assignments a month late. :P

Social Facilitation!

Social Facilitation is fascinated. It is amazing how someone's performance of an act can get better if the right people are looking. 

In 1898 Norman Triplett observed a bike race. He saw that the bikers who where trying to beat another biker appose to the clock, rode faster. He then did an experiment on children going fishing. Some where placed near a partner on the lake others alone. He found that the children with a partner reeled in the fish quicker and caught more. Thus it was the beginning of the understanding of social facilitation. 

Thinking about this topic I realized how often this happens. Someone is driving a car, place their mom in the car and suddenly they are a better driver. A teacher can be giving a lesson but the moment a principle is there observing her lessons get so much better. Or if someone is jogging and knows that they have an audience from a car suddenly they will pick up the pace. If someone is working out at the gym and someone they like is watching them, suddenly they can lift heavier weights. 

Maybe the next time I need to do something I will get myself an audience so I will do better. 

Do you see this happening through our your life? Is this a proof that cheerleaders can help? What are your thoughts?

Spite and Malace

My AP Psychology classmates! Oh, how I've missed you all! Hope everything is faring you well back in Memphis,TN. Now, I know you have been missing reading my blogs so dearly, so I won't waste any more time with chit-chat. 

Spite. That word carries with it a very negative connotation.  You wouldn't necessarily want one of your parents to tell you you're "doing something out of spite," especially because the next thing they'd tell you would be- "Don't do that!" Spite is the urge to punish, hurt, humiliate or harass another, even when one gains no obvious benefit and may well pay a cost. Before you read: What are your feelings about spite? Have you ever experienced it? Do you believe it to be petty, or a natural human inclination? Click here to read Natalie Angier's "Spite Is Good. Spite Works" to find out what scientists have to say about spite, then come back here for we shall discuss!                                                                                                                            

It's interesting to note that the study of spite has been pretty much neglected in the scientific community until recently. Pretty odd, don't ya think, considering how many people experience it at one point or another? Currently, psychologists are studying spite as a negative trait. Evolutionary theorists, on the other hand, are doing what evolutionary theorists usually do, and are studying the role that spite may have played in the origin or admirable traits (eg: cooperative spirit, sense of fair play). In the past months, David K. Marcus, a psychologist at Washington State University, and his colleagues have presented the preliminary results from their new "spitefulness scale". Let's give it a try. How closely do you agree with the following statements:

If my neighbor complained about the appearance of my front yard,  I would be tempted to make it look worse just to annoy him or her.

If I opposed the election of an official, I would happily see the person fail even if the failure hurt my community.

I would be willing to take a punch if it meant someone I did not like would receive two punches.

If you don't feel comfortable responding you don't have to, but did you agree with any of the statement above? Would you consider it but not go through with it?

According to their research thusfar, men are more spiteful than women and young adults are more spiteful than older ones. Spitefulness generally cohabited (but remember- correlation doesn't imply causation!) with traits like callousness and poor self-esteem. Partisan politics can provoke spiteful outbursts from otherwise temperate people. For those political animals out there- do you ever have spiteful feelings toward a politician you dislike? 

Some research finds that the presence of spiteful people keeps others in check. This "altruistic punishment"-the willingness of some individuals to punish rule breakers even when the infraction doesn't directly affect them- is necessary to human decency. What do you think about altruistic punishment? Do we have the right to punish people for doing what we deem is wrong? Then again, should their bad deed go unpunished? Is there any way that spite could be a gateway to fair punishment? 

One last fun fact to note: the people who are most vocal against others using performance-enhancing drugs are usually the ones who are using them. Surprising? Spiteful? Why? 

Dat Accent

         Well everyone, we've made it almost to the end. Finishing the last unit was almost as satisfying as finishing the last unit assignment. Anyway, this week I wanted to focus on one of the last things of AP Psychology that we learned: attraction.

         We discussed the different factors that influence whether we will like other people. Firstly, proximity is important, as actually being near to someone and interacting with them already makes it more likely that you will like them. The next factor is the mere exposure effect, which is that repeated exposure to novel stimuli increases your liking of them. You are more likely to like the people you have seen before. The third factor is physical attractiveness. This varies by culture, but it seems that within every society people are more pleasant to look at are automatically more likable.

         The fourth factor is similarity. Though many believe that "opposites attract", this doesn't seem to frequently be the case. Those who share similar values, culture, and ideas as you are more likable as well, as it easier to get along with them. The last factor we discussed was the reward theory of attraction. This theory states that we like those whose behavior is rewarding to us and we continue relationships that offer more rewards than costs.

          With initial attraction comes love. The two types of romantic love are passionate love and companionate love. Passionate love is an aroused state of intense positive absorption in another person. It is a feeling of euphoria, where you feel as if the other person can do know wrong. However, this type of feeling is not usually sustained over a long period of time, as it would be very difficult to get anything done. Companionate love, on the other hand, is a more mature, deep, and affectionate attachment. It is the sign of a long term relationship. A loving relationship requires equity, where both people receive the same amount they give, and self-disclosure, where both people reveal intimate details about their lives.

         Over Shabbos, Racheli (Brakha) came up with the idea that foreign accents make people more attractive. I thought this over and decided that it would be worth while to blog about. It does seem like people who have exotic accents automatically become more attractive to us mere Americans. On divinecaroline.com, Kathryn Williams (from Nashville!) discussed why accents seem to have this power. She brings an idea from Susan Tamasi, a sociolinguist from Emory University in Atlanta, who says it has to do with aesthetics. A preference for an accent apparently comes from the associations we make with a certain accent or dialect. This could also explain why some accents are attractive while others are vomit-inducing.

         Proof of this comes from England, where the RP accent (the "Queen's English") is associated with the more wealthy of the British school system. According to Williams, this is why many foreigners see people who speak with a British accent as having more intelligence and prestige. On the opposite end, a Southern accent may make non-Southerns assume the person to be ignorant or stupid because of stereotypes associated with hillbillies or Southern belles.

         Which accent do you find the most attractive? Do you think that has come about because of associations you may have made? If so, which associations? 

2048: Is Dopamine the Cause of Our Addiction?

So, last night, I was searching the world-wide interweb for the popular game 2048, as I wanted to partake in the pleasure of playing this wildly addictive game. While my page loaded, I stumbled (yes, Lily, stumbled) upon an interesting article describing the addictive nature of the game. For all of you who are unfamiliar with this game, the concept/objective is to match numbers until you achieve the sum of a 2048 tile, hence the 2048. For all of those who do play the game, you are probably familiar with the overwhelming desire to achieve this tile. Anywho, a neurologist by the name of Judy Willis (who is also an adjunct faculty member at the Graduate School of Education at University of California, Santa Barbara), explains the science of our addictions, and it has to do with our friend,  dopamine.

We were first introduced to dopamine, one of the most well-known neurotransmitters, in Chapter 3A. Dopamine is responsible for the regulation of motor activity, motivation, and pleasure. Low levels of dopamine result in Parkinson's disease and in high levels, schizophrenia ensues. Addictive drugs can also stimulate the dopamine pathway, while antipsychotic drugs such as Chlorpromazine and Thorazine block receptor sites so excess dopamine can't be used. This may prevent the hallucinations and paranoia (positive symptoms) of schizophrenia. Clozapine, another antipsychotic drug, helps with regulating both the serotonin and dopamine receptors and can alleviate some of the negative symptoms of schizophrenia.

So, how does this relate to 2048? Well, my friends, as aforementioned, dopamine is responsible for a multitude of things, but when it builds up, the brain goes into hyperdrive. "Dopamine is the one of the most compelling neurochemicals—and the most addictive drugs—that we know of," Willis explains. Dopamine increases pleasure and perseverance while minimizing stress. Even something seemingly insignificant, such as winning a bet, can boost your dopamine levels.

In the realm of 2048, it offers us the following two dopamine enhancers. The first is the power of prediction. The brain takes great delight in making predictions, and in 2048, the brain is given every opportunity to do so. Willis brings in several studies conducted by James Paul Gee, which have discovered that predictions still result in a dopamine boost at an 80 percent fail rate—which means that even if you manage to make a mess of your 2048 scoreboard eight times out of ten, your brain will still demand that you continue playing. The effects of dopamine guarantee that even when you do not succeed in reaching 2048, you'll remain relatively calm about it. "Instead of being stressed out, the brain is so comfortable that it doesn't want to quit," Willis remarks.

The second is an achievable challenge: If a game is too easy or too difficult, dopamine levels stop flowing at this high rate. "For the optimal boost," Willis says, "a game needs to be challenging but beatable. 'Achievable challenge' are the key words. That's what will give you the biggest dopamine boost." Therefore, 2048 is challenging, yet possible, so we continue to play.

What do you think of this? Is dopamine really the cause of our "addiction" to 2048? If not, what other factors might be involved? And on a side note, what is your high score? 

Here is the link to the article: http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/gadgets/video-games/why-the-2048-game-is-so-addictive-16659899

I Accidentally Kinda Used the Low-ball Technique at Target

After Mrs. Perl's fabulous Latte & Learning event Sunday night, I headed over to Target to pick up some school clothes. I tried on a few shirts, and my dad agreed to pay for one of them. The initial price of that one shirt was low, so he was happy to cover my purchase. As we headed to the checkout,  I explained that my other shirt was on sale, and he decided to just pay for both of them and cover my total purchase. As we were leaving the store, I pulled a Mrs. Perl realized that what just happened to me was totally one of the psychological phenomena we discussed in class.

As we learned, the low-ball technique is a form of persuasion or sales technique that offers an item or service at a lower price than is to be actually paid in the end. When I initially asked for one shirt, it seemed like a good deal. When I threw in the second one, it didn't seem like a major difference, so my dad just agreed to pay for all of it. So guys, next time you really need some school shirts, try the low-ball technique on your parental authorities. It just might score you an extra shirt from Target. Woohoo!

I'm Going to Convince Myself That My Actions Are Okay

Last week we started social psychology. Social psychology is defined as the branch of psychology concerned with the way individual's thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by others. It therefore scientifically studies how we think about, influence, and relate to one another.

• How does out perceptions and thoughts impact how we see other people?
• How does other peoples' actions impact us?
• How does the way we interact with others impact us?

Cognitive  Dissonance: 

This video starts off giving an example: Your parents tell you that people with blue eyes are bad, so you grow up with the idea that people with blue eyes are bad people. Later in life, you begin to meet and interact with people with blue eyes and you realize that they are not so bad. Since you must listen to your parents, you convince yourself that people with blue eyes are, indeed, bad. 

Then the video goes on to explain to us the experiment of Leon Festinger: he had people come in and did a boring job. After they did the job, they would have to convince another person to also do the job. One group was offered $1 to do the job and the other was offered $20 to do the job. The people who got $20 said that it was kind of boring, but they got $20. The other group, who got $1 said that it was kind of cool and pretty fun. If they can't change their actions, then they will change their attitudes. The people convince themselves that they are telling the truth and that they enjoyed it. 

Impact of role-playing on attitude and action: 

As I was watching the other video, the beginning reminded me of another video that I (and I think many of you) have seen before. For an experiment on discrimination a teacher told students that one day was a special day for people with blue eyes and the next day is a special day for the people with brown eyes. Whichever color eyes you had, and whichever day it was, you were either seen as greater or lesser. The kids got to act greater, but really they began to feel greater and made the other people with the bad color eyes that day, feel much worse. They became the role that they were acting, like what happened in Phillip Zimbardo's prison experiment. 

Are politicians sociopaths?

When I read the definition of antisocial personality disorder, the first thing that popped into my head was "politicians." Of course not all politicians are legitimate psychopaths, but for some reason the description of this disorder seems to fit your stereotypical picture of a politician - charming, manipulative, will do anything to ensure their power.

In an Huffington post article, Dr. Martha Stout, a clinical psychologists and author of popular books on emotional disorders, said that despite the lack of statistical evidence on the matter:

 "Yes, politicians are more likely than people in the general population to be sociopaths. I think you would find no expert in the field of sociopathy, psychopathy, anti social personality disorder who would dispute this... That is a small minority of human beings literally have no conscience was and is a bitter pill for our society to swallow -- but it does explain a great many things, shamelessly, deceitful political behavior being one."

Dr. Stout proposes that to avoid admitting sociopaths to office, political candidates should be able to prove their psychological health, through perhaps something like the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory.

I know, for one thing, that Vice President Frank Underwood from the show House of Cards must be a sociopath. All he cares about is rising up the ranks, and he does that through his southern charm, deceit, manipulation, and even murder. (Spoiler) Take for example when he pushes a reporter in front of of an oncoming train when she mentions her suspicion that he was responsible (which he really was) for the murder of another politician (which was staged as a suicide). Fun!

Role Playing!

Role Playing got be totally intrigued. The whole concept kind of freaked me out. 

We all know about Phillip Zembardo and the Stanford Prison Experiment.  We all know that it was proven very quickly that people can begin to actually feel and do things like the thing they are acting out, even when they know they are acting. 

If you speak to mostly any actor, they would most likely say that when they are acting in a movie it is like there whole life becomes that character. In order to truly play the role you are acting well, you have to actually feel like that person.

I was thinking about this whole concept and brought it to a whole other level. What if everything we do, work, play, study is all really role playing. We start of thrown into a school and we are told how to act and what to do. We are like actors, but then it becomes who we are. We do not have to think twice about how to act or what to do, because it is us, we becomes  student. Then slowly through out life it is all about first just role playing. Role playing at your job. Role playing when you get married. Role playing when you have kids. It eventually turns into who we are. 

So then maybe you can throw anybody into any situation and they will eventually be fine. If someone who thinks they are unkabable of running a company, yet it suddenly gets placed on their shoulders that they must do it. So they act all CEO like and start running it. Until eventually they feel like someone who is running a company, that is who they are. 

If this is true. I wonder if you think so. Then wouldn't we all be able to do anything we set our minds to. We just need to pretend long enough until it become what we can and feel. I think this can be a scary thing as well, However I do believe that this proves, you can do anything if you try hard enough. What do you think? 

Stanford Prison Experiment and the Holocaust

This past week, we started learning about social psychology and about how attitudes influences actions and actions influence attitudes. We briefly mentioned the Stanford Prison Experiment, saying that our buddy Philip Zimbardo conducted a week-long experiment at Stanford to test the influence of roleplaying on actions and attitudes. His findings were astounding: within one day, the "prisoners" actually started acting like prisoners and the "guards" actually starting acting as if they had all of the power and that they could abuse the prisoners. Remember that all of these people knew they were taking part in a psychological study and got so engrossed in the role play that they actually started behaving as if they were their roles. The prisoners exhibited a lot of learned helplessness in terms of escaping punishment and warding off the guards. Actually, the new behaviors got so out of control that Philip Zimbardo had to call off the experiment after only two days in order to prevent any major psychological damage.

The first time I heard about this experiment was at NCSY National Yarchei Kallah this past winter break. After Maariv one night, I attended an optional session led by one of the rabbis there. Although I have since forgotten the title of the session, I remember that it was all about whether or not a person could actually be as evil as the Nazis were towards other human beings. The rabbi there, also a psychologist, started the session by asking us if we thought it was possible for a regular person to suddenly act like a monster when put in a role play situation. The vast majority of the kids present, including myself, said that we thought it was possible but unlikely because role play is just that: pretend. We thought that people would be able to snap out of it when their behavior or attitudes got overly immoral. Then, the rabbi brought up the Stanford Prison Experiment. Everyone was flabbergasted and truly shocked. No one thought that this type of situation could bring out the "monster within" and none of us thought that the monsters would be that evil. In conclusion, it's incredibly interesting to see how role play played such a huge role in one of the biggest collective tragedies that the Jews have ever faced because the Nazi guards were put in a situation of power over the helpless Jews and were commanded to use their power. I don't feel pity for the Nazis, but I think this gives some insight into why they did what they did and why the atrocities tended towards the extreme.

Here's a video of the experiment. Viewer Discretion is Advised.

Got My Foot Caught in the Door

Oops! Have you ever agreed to a really big job because you already involved yourself in it on a smaller scale? I know that I have! This is commonly known as the Foot in the Door Phenomenon. When salesmen used to make door calls, they used to just try and get their foot in the door and that would have the customer hooked. By letting the salesman in, you were agreeing to something small with implication of agreeing to something larger later.

If you ever try and ask someone to do something big at first, they are going to most likely say no, but if they have been involved in the project recently or been asked to do something smaller for it, they are more likely to say yes. For example if I ask you to make 200 cookies off the bat, you are most likely going to say no. But, if I ask you to go shopping for the ingredients with me, you feel like you are obligated to do something with those ingredients and soon you will have made 200 cookies.

It happens to all of us. When have you experienced the Foot in the Door Phenomenon?

Why Aren't We More Compassionate?

I know this is a bit of a throwback, as I'm about to talk about emotional intelligence, something we studied way-back-when in Chapter 11, but I recently stumbled on a TED talk given by Daniel Goleman, entitled, "Why Aren't We More Compassionate?" and found it super-interesting and somewhat related to social psychology, as it talks about how we interact with others, so I thought I'd share. So, let me begin first by reviewing emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence, based off of Sternberg's ideas, essentially says that academic intelligence is necessary for rigorous professions but once you get to a certain level of academic intelligence where everyone possesses similar qualities, it is social and emotional intelligence that dictates success. Peter Salovey and John Mayer coined this idea with the MEIS (multi-factor emotional intelligence scale) in 1995. However, it was popularized by Daniel Goleman, who also produced the term EQ, or emotional quotient, a play on words.

Goleman believed that EQ indicated social intelligence. It is the ability to perceive emotions (recognizing them in faces, music, and stories, reading the tone of a room, recognizing emotion in others), express emotions (to enable adaptive and creative thinking, the ability to be empathetic, and give people the sense that you are listening to them and understanding them), understand emotions (predict them and understand how they change and blend, and internalize what surrounds you), and regulate emotions (know how to express them in varied situations, such as remaining calm in the face of a stressful context). The emotional intelligence scale is designed to assess the appraisal, expression, and regulation of emotion in the self and others and the utilization of emotion in solving problems.

Goleman begins his talk by mentioning a critical study done at Princeton Theological Seminary that seems to explain why it is that when we have the opportunity to help, sometimes we do, and other times, we don't. The experiment was done as follows: A group of divinity students at the Princeton Theological Seminary were instructed that they were to give a practice sermon, and were each assigned a sermon topic. Half of the students were given, as a topic, the parable of the Good Samaritan, the man who stopped to help a stranger in need by the side of the road. The other half were given random Bible topics. Then, they were told that they would need to switch to another building to deliver the sermon. As they walked from the first building to the second, they each passed a man who was clearly in dire need. The question is: Did they help? And moreover, did the fact that they were mulling over the parable of the Good Samaritan affect their actions? However, what determined whether or not these students stopped to help was how much of a hurry that believed themselves to be in.

There is a new emerging field in brain science, called social neuroscience. It examines the circuitry in two people's brains that activates while they interact. And the findings concerning compassion from the social neuroscience perspective is that our" default wiring" is to help. This means that if we attend to another, we automatically emphasize and feel with them, due to our mirror neurons. However, when we're preoccupied or focused on ourselves, we don't feel this click, and don't completely notice one another, thus preventing us from stopping to help.

Goleman then mentions an interview his brother-in-law conducted with a famous killer, known as the Santa Cruz strangler. The most morbid part of the experience was figuring out that this murderer had an IQ of 160, a certified genius. But there is no correlation between IQ and emotional empathy, as they're controlled by different parts of the brain. At one point, Goleman's brother-in-law asked the man how he could have done it. And the response he received was: "Oh no. If I'd felt the distress, I could not have done it. I had to turn that part of me off. I had to turn that part of me off."

This idea, of turning emotions off, is a frequent theme of the popular television show, The Vampire Diaries. In the supernatural world of vampires, they are given the ability to quite literally "turn their emotions off," and as a result, feel no remorse for their actions.

What do you think of Goleman's conclusion? 

For your viewing pleasure, the video is below.

It Was Totally Worth It

         This week in AP Psychology we discussed social psychology. *sniff* It's our last chapter unit! We learned that social psychology includes social thinking, social influences, and social relations. Within social thinking, we discussed attribution process and attitudes. I was most interested in the attitude portion, in which we learned how attitudes affect actions and how actions affect attitudes.

         "Actions affect our attitudes" simply means that the way we act impacts the way we think. Many phenomenons arise with this concept, including that of the foot-in-the-door phenomenon. This is the tendency to agree to something larger after originally agreeing to something smaller. For instance, you ask someone to get you some water because you happen to be extremely busy. Oh, you know what, you really need caffeine, so they could just go on a Starbucks run really quick, right? Once you get your foot in the door, it's easy to get someone to agree to something bigger.

         The opposite of this phenomenon would be the door-in-the-face phenomenon, which is the tendency to agree to a smaller request if the original one was larger. For instance, using the same example, you first ask someone if they could go run out to Starbucks to get you something. They say no, as they don't really want to go all the way out there now, so you sneak in a smaller request- could they just grab you a cup of water quickly then?

         Then comes brainwashing. Overtime, when forced to repeatedly act in a way that goes against your values or beliefs, you will change your beliefs. This has to do with cognitive dissonance, where conflict between action and belief causes you to either change your actions or your beliefs.

         Another concept that arises is the impact of role-playing on attitude and action. If you act in a certain way, it will affect your attitude. Even when understanding that you are simply playing a role, you can still change the way you behave. When learning this, I had a flash back to a book I read a while ago, in 8th grade I believe, called Home for the Holidays. It is part of a series called The Mother-Daughter Book Club, which I was obsessed with. Anyway, in this particular book, one of the main characters, Becca, decides to take on an alter-ego to feel more confident. She pretends to be playing the role of Rebecca, someone who exudes confidence and charm. Eventually, she begins to act as snottily as Rebecca would, which ruins many of her relationships with her friends and family. Even though she knew it was just a role, she eventually began to take on the attitude of her alter-ego.

         Cognitive dissonance is the last phenomenon that arises. Leon Festinger came up with the idea that when you act in a ways that you cannot justify, it creates dissonance. This conflict comes up between your actions and your attitude. You've acted in a way that goes against your attitude of it. This unpleasant state of tension can only be relieved by either changing your actions or changing your attitude.

         When looking up examples of cognitive dissonance to make it more applicable to everyday life, I found one that actually directly relates to what I did today. On psychohawks.wordpress.com, Sam Eddy gives everyday examples of how cognitive dissonance arises. One being that Sarah buys a new car that cost a lot more than she could really afford. However, instead of feeling the uncomfortable emotions of regret and embarrassment at spending more than she should have, she convinces herself that the new car is in much better condition than her old one, and will save her a lot of money in the long run. Today, I went to Stein Mart and bought some clothes for Pesach. Although I do need some snazzy things for the holiday, I did feel like I could have spent less money. But, of course I'll where the clothes all the time, so it was totally worth it.

Link: http://psychohawks.wordpress.com/2010/09/01/cognitive-dissonance-made-easy/

Divergent-Psychology 101

The last few weeks, Divergent--the movie slated to be the next Hunger Games--has been on all over the media. Interestingly, the movie was inspired by psychology! I was reading my People magazine, as I often do on a Friday night, and I saw the words "fear" and "anxiety," so of course I stopped to read the article. The article was on Veronica Roth, the author of the best-selling book, now movie. She talked about how she battles chronic anxiety and has occasional panic attacks. As her own therapy, she wrote about a "character who meets her fears head-on."

Roth started writing Divergent as a senior at Northwestern where she was taking a Psychology 101 class. The topic we just finished learning about, psychotherapy, is what really inspired her. She was studying exposure therapy and thought that it was fascinating. Exposure therapy is a part of behavioral therapy and counter-conditioning. Counter-conditioning is using classical conditioning to replace an unwanted response to a (scary) stimulus to the desired response to that same stimulus. Exposure therapy may consist of systematic desensitization and progressive relaxation. This basically means that to overcome a phobia, the patient will be gradually exposed to the thing they are scared of while in a controlled setting and while being consistently relaxed between exposures.

In the book, the city is made up of factions. One of these factions, Dauntless, values courage and fearlessness. As part of their training, they must go through simulations where they face their each of their fears. This is like an extreme version of exposure therapy without the systematic desensitization and progressive relaxation. They are just thrown into situations where they must face their fears. Roth says that she wanted to write about people who used exposure therapy not just to get rid of unwanted phobias, but to become completely fearless.

Roth was also inspired by the study of obedience in social psychology. We have not gotten up to it yet in class, but one of the most famous experiments dealing with social psychology is Stanley Milgram's experiment on obedience. His goal was to test people's willingness to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform actions that conflicted with their personal values. His results were that people are likely to go to almost any lengths to if a person of authority demands them to--even if conflicts with their personal values (in the experiment, they had to punish someone with an electric shock--65% were willing to give a 450-volt shock to the participant). This concept of disregarding our own moral principles in order to comply with the demands of a person in authority is something Roth is constantly exploring throughout the series.

Western Society - What's Going On?

We previously learned about bulimia, anorexia, and binge eating, disorders where people's eating habits become harmful and abnormal. We also learned that these disorders may stem from a need for control, and are also almost primarily found in Western cultures. Recently, we also learned about another Western phenomenon: Dissociative Identity disorder. Formerly known as Multiple-Personality disorder, this is when a person exhibits two or more distinct and alternating personalities. Skeptics believe that this may be a cultural thing, of which eating disorders are a part of as well. DID goes along with the theory about hypnosis that it stems from a person's desire to basically put on a good show, and when urged by therapists, to create another side to themselves.
What is up with our society that we do things like this? Why in the world does this happen? Perhaps, it has something to do with a loss of control, as suggested by those knowledgeable about eating disorders. Westerners have it all; the technology, the wealth, the free time, etc. We think we control ourselves, and in a way, we do. We are, after all, more focused on the good of the individual, as opposed to communal welfare. This may be the very root of the problem. We are so plugged into everything else around us, and so focused on climbing up the ladder of life, that we lose part of ourselves in the process. The world, our culture, and our society essentially control what we do in our lives, what choices we make, and who we become. This may give a person, when and if they consider this idea, the feeling of a loss of control. Another way to look at this is to visualize the size of an ant compared to the size of a mountain. We would be the ant. In a culture such as ours, the disparity between the amount of control we have in our lives, and the actual amount of control we have in our lives is immense. Perhaps this is why Western cultures have disorders such as these; perhaps this lack of control is too much to bear, and these disorders are a way of expressing this feeling.

What do you think of this idea?

O-C-What?

For some reason, OCD has been colloquially mixed up with OCPD. For some altogether different reason, this greatly bothers me. There is a large difference between the two, other than just one letter. I am here to disprove some of the incorrect ideas people have about the disorder OCD.

1. OCD has to do with germs.
Not necessarily. People with OCD would not be your typical neat-freak. They would be your neat-freak to unfathomable extremes. Consider this: would washing your hands roughly and repeatedly until the skin is painful and peeling be considered a trait of a neat-freak? NO. Neat freaks may be obsessive, but they do not have the compulsions associated with actual OCD. Next time you go on a cleaning spree, remind yourself of this.

2. It is a term to describe unusual behavior.
It really depends on what behavior you're talking about. As far as abnormal psychology is concerned, it qualifies. However, labeling someone who collects raw noodles, or something else "odd", as OCD is not accurate.

3. People with OCD are ok with their behavior.
No, they most certainly are not. People with OCPD very well may be. However, a large component of OCD is frustration about the obsessions that lead to compulsions to combat a certain anxiety, in which this behavior feels unstoppable and out of a person's control.

4. People who are super sports enthusiasts or obsessed with a certain celebrity are OCD.
Try again. These people may be obsessed, but this alone does not mean a person is OCD. They just really like something to the point that it may run their lives, which is a different problem altogether.

These are just a few common misconceptions that people have about OCD. I hope this helps clarifiy what OCD actually is!

Why We Must Be Cautious

Recently, someone told me about the book Brain on Fire by Susannah Cahalan. Shockingly, this true story is about how the author went through a month of symptoms that resembled schizophrenia, dissosciative fugue, as well as dementia. Prior to this, she had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Apparently, she woke up one morning and didn't know who she was, or what was going on. She had been having violent episodes and delusions, and no one knew what was wrong with her. She went through test after test, and was diagnosed with all kinds of psychological disorders. In the end (SPOILER ALERT), one doctor realized almost by accident that the cause of this all stemmed from a biological cause. It turns out that Cahalan had Anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis, which was only categorized as a disease in 2007. This autoimmune disease caused half of her brain to be inflamed, which prompted her symptoms. Apparently, this didn't show up in any other tests, and doctors assumed that she was crazy and that it was all in her head. What's weirder is that apparently there are a number of people with this easily treatable disease who don't have a diagnosis and are left to suffer.
My point in sharing this story is to highlight why doctors must be extraordinarily careful in diagnosing and treating patients with psychological disorders. If a person is incorrectly diagnosed and treated, the results could end up badly. Also, many people in previous years who may have been diagnosed with any of the psychological disorders that Cahalan was diagnosed with but were not responsive to treatment may have had similar health problems as her, but this may have never been identified. When treating anything that has to do with the brain, one must use caution and not make hasty decisions, for there is much at stake.

Who Am I?

When we started learning about psychological disorders, I was looking forward to two specific ones: Dissociative Fugue and Dissociate Identity Disorder. These two disorders are so often used to create some drama and twists on television shows that they seem common to me. I guess that just shows how the media really does impact how we think. Anyway, after we learned about them in class, I realized that they are definitely not common and one of them might not even be real! Dissociative Identity Disorder is pretty controversial, like hypnosis it. For that reason, I will not even waste precious blog space writing about it. Its just too troubling to me. I will instead shift my focus to Dissociative Fugue--otherwise known as the amnesia that makes you forget your identity (but you still, for some odd reason, remember how to speak english). Even though it's rare, there are cases where people have had a sudden loss of identity. Let's take a look at the case of John Ingram.

Ingram's finacee told police that he was on his way to visit a friend in Canada who was dying from cancer. She believed that the stress and grief might have caused the amnesia. On September 10, 2006, Ingram wound up in a hospital in Denver after asking several people on the street for help since he could not remember who he was. There, he was diagnosed with the mysterious disorder of Dissociative Fugue. Experts have said that this disorder is typically linked to stress so it's definitely possible that that is what caused it. For the next few months, Ingram was featured on some news shows in hopes someone would recognize him. His finacee's brother recognized him and within a few days, John and his finacee were reunited. He still did not regain his memory, but the two have been working on it ever since.

Just a few years ago, another story was featured in the New York Times about a young teacher who went missing and was also diagnosed with Dissociative Fugue when she was found. Apparently, those who have this disorder tend to have a sudden impulse to travel away from their homes. It's just such a weird disorder. The scariest part is that it can happen at any time. The disorder is such a mystery to psychologists that they cannot identify the cause. It can strike at any time. Some say stress is partly the cause but we do not know for sure. Like all psychological disorders, this one really does impede your functioning--after all, once it hits, you're just lost.

Depending on which perspective you take, there are a few ways of treating this disorder. Psychotherapy, as in counseling, is the main way it is treating. The therapist attempts to gain insight into whatever is causing the sudden memory loss. Medication is not used for this disorder unless there are also signs of another disorder, such as depression. Clinical hypnosis has been used before to try to bring hidden memories and thoughts out from the unconscious. Different creative therapies such as music and art therapy have been used as well as family therapy. Most of the time Dissociative Fugue vanishes on its own--because it's just that weird.

Anyway, what do you guys think the weirdest/scariest disorder is? How would you treat Dissociative Fugue?

The Real Definition of Abnormal Behaviors

When we first started the packet of abnormal behavior in class, we defined what we believed abnormal behavior meant. As a class, we decided that it meant that it didn't fit what was societal norms - psychologically and socially, It doesn't fit what most people's usual behaviors were, it was out of the ordinary, and it was harmful, disruptive, and unpredictable.

After we defined abnormal behavior, we went through a list of stories and people's behaviors and we had to decide if that was a psychological disorder or not. We went through and said if we believed it was a psychological disorder or not and then justified our answers. Some of the things we saw were psychological disorders and the others were just strange behaviors but not actually seen as a psychological disorder.

I think that what we did was have a prototype person with a psychological disorder and we pictured them in out head and it skewed what we thought a person with psychological disorder acted as. Looking back after learning in depth what psychological disorders were and how they were defined, the stories we read were all psychological disorders. At that point, we were only able to see the prototype and what thoughts were available in our mind at that time.

The actual potential elements of abnormal behavior are:

Atypical-Statistical deviation: Since many human characteristics are normally distributed, according to this idea the defining characteristic of abnormal behavior is an "uncommon behavior" that is a significant deviation from the average/majority.

Disturbing-Social norm violation: Most of our behavior is shaped by the norms - cultural expectations about the right and wrong way to do things. This therefore defines abnormal behavior as breaking unwritten social "rules."

Maladaptive Behavior: 1) Maladaptive to one's self - inability to reach goals, to adapt to the demands of life 2) Maladaptive to society - interferes, disrupts social group functioning

Personal Distress: Put simply, if the person is content with his/her life, then s/he is of no concern to the mental health field. If, on the other hand, the person is distressed (depressed, anxious, etc.) then those behaviors and thoughts that the person is unhappy about are abnormal behaviors and thoughts.

Unjustifiable: The elements of abnormal behavior cannot be justified by health factors, recent life events, or other medical explanations.

Personality Disorders

A personality disorder is defined as a disruptive, inflexible, and enduring patterns of behavior that impair one's social functioning. Personality disorders are split into three different clusters: 
1. Anxiety 2. Eccentric behaviors and 3. Dramatic or impulsive behaviors

There are 6 different types of personality disorders:
1. Avoidant Personality Disorder: Fearful sensitivity to rejection - the person is constantly being afraid of being rejected and it's not just in certain situations, it's in every situation that they are in. After a while of avoiding people and being to afraid to talk to them, people will stop interacting with you as well.

2. Narcissistic personality disorder: Self-focused and self-inflating - The person is so focused on themselves that they will push themselves up without caring if they are pushing anyone down. They are full of themselves and everything is about "me." They have no empathy for others. Also, they are very manipulative.

3. Histrionic Personality disorder: Dramatic, impulsive, and attention-seeking behaviors - They always need to be the center of attention and they crave inappropriate behaviors. They want to have an intense relationship with someone. They are very superficial and are more likely to have risk taking behaviors. They want to have these behaviors and they have them all the time. 

4. Antisocial Personality Disorder: (psychopath) lack of conscience that cause the person to lie, steal, fight, or display unrestrained sexual behaviors - They don't feel guilty for their actions. A rapist is more likely to be a psychopath. They are very charming. It's not just their personality, there is also a different brain activity that a psychopath will have: There is reduced activity in the murderers’ frontal lobes, which is an area of the cortex that helps control impulses. Violent repeat offenders had 11% less frontal lobe tissue than normal.

5. Schizoid Personality disorder: Eccentric behaviors focusing on emotionless disengagement - They are really emotionally disengaged. They are more dark, gothic people who don't conform to society. It is considered Schizoid Personality disorder when it is extreme to the point where it impedes their functioning.

6. Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder: Obsession with cleanliness, orderliness, and neatness - It is a rigid way of thinking. They are very neat and organized. It impact their functioning and other peoples' lives. They are obsessed with everything being cleaned. They are not aware that they are doing these things.

I think that the worst at of all of these are Antisocial Personality Disorder. Where the other Personality Disorders are effecting other peoples' lives also, this one is truly harmful to other peoples' lives. It isn't just different behaviors that they perform that are not seen as "normal" in society. It is that they don't realize that they are doing something wrong and they are truly harming someone's life without even noticing it and I think that's what makes it the scariest. 

Labeling

An Abnormal behavior is defined as a behavior that is a harmful dysfunction that is atypical, disturbing, maladaptive, and unjustifiable.

An abnormal behavior becomes a psychological disorder if it persists over time and it becomes deviant, distressful, dysfunctional pattern of thoughts, feelings, or behaviors.

There are a few problems that come when you label a person with an abnormal behavior. When you label them, you imply that that person has a deficiency and you see them as having a problem. Also, it gives them a label or a stigma and you interact with that person differently.

David Rosenhan did research and found that when you hear someone has a psychological disorder, you see everything they do as being because of the disorder.

What David Rosenhan did was that him and a few of his colleagues checked themselves into a mental hospital by faking a symptom. They said they heard voices. When they were admitted to the hospital, they stopped their behaviors and behaved "normally" again. They wanted to see if anyone would detect that they were sane. No one did. They were diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and they were discharged with paranoid schizophrenia in remission. He described that experience as dehumanizing. No body cared for them or contacted them or came to visit them.

David Rosenhan describes a mental hospital as a place of storage for people that others do not understand or want to be around and for people others have lost sympathy for. The staff only recognized the people as people with symptoms of psychological disorders. David Rosenhan decribes this people with what others would see as "normal" not someone just with the psychological disorder.

Don't get me wrong, I think it's important for a person to be diagnosed with the psychological disorder that they have so that they can be treated. I'm not entirely sure how that could be changed. I just think that it's wrong that once a person is "labeled" with a disorder, they become that disorder and that is all that people see about them.

"I'm a boy climber"

Gender Roles: What is expected for men and what is expected for women? This is what society expects how men and women to behave.

Gender Identity: Our sense of being male or female. What do we think is a typical male or female?

Gender typed: The acquisition of the traditional male or female role. How do you acquire the role?

Social Learning Theory: The theory that we learn social behavior by observing and imitating and being rewarded or punished.

Gender Schema theory: Form a lens through which to view experiences of information into schemas. (he/she, long/short hair, dresses/pants.)

I work in the Young Israel groups and this week my kids were playing on the playground. They were all playing around, and one of the girls was climbing on the playground. She was climbing and I asked if she was okay and if she knew what she was doing. She said she's done it before and that she is okay. When she finished climbing over things she was proud of herself and she exclaimed "I'm a boy climber, I can climb like a boy." When I heard this I immediately thought of psychology class.

Also, later that day, the same girl was playing around where the boys were and she took one of the things that they were playing with. Later, she came up to me and told me that the boys were scared of her and how funny it is that boys are scared of a girl and that's not how it's supposed to be.

These events made me think a lot about what society has become. How there are separate strengths or fears that only girls are suppose to have. It made me wonder if it's just the way the gender roles have evolved over time or is it the way people raise their kids what to believe?

Panic Disorder: An Endless Loop

In Unit 12, we discussed the many psychological disorders that exist, what categorizes them, and in Unit 13, how to treat them. One of the categories of psychological disorders we learned about were the anxiety disorders. Panic disorder, an anxiety disorder, is characterized by four "stages," which are on a continuous loop. The first is body sensations, in which an unusual bodily sensation (e.g. pounding heart), makes you react with fear that something bad is going to happen. The second is a panic attack, where your continued over-reaction to the bodily sensations triggers more fear and eventually leads to a full-fledged panic attack. The third is high anxiety: Once the panic attack subsides, you are left feeling anxious and in a very sensitive state. And the fourth is fear of fear. You fear of having another panic attack keeps your anxiety levels high and this leads to further unusual bodily sensations. The panic loop is now established. 

Panic disorder is like "anxiety on steroids," and can occur at any time. The person will feel as if they are going to die. Sometimes it is caused by something specific, other times not. However, the fear and dread of having another attack is completely frightening. Panic attacks are characterized by this intense terror of disaster or of losing control even when there is no real, imminent danger. A person can also have a physical reaction during a panic attack, and may feel as if they are having a heart attack. Panic disorder sometimes runs in families, but there is no concrete evidence for why some have it and others do not. Researchers have found several parts in the brain associated with fear and anxiety (the amygdala, for example), and are also further investigating the relative contributions of stress and environment. 

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, people with panic disorder may have the following: "sudden and repeated attacks of fear, a feeling of being out of control during a panic attack, an intense worry about when the next attack will happen, a fear or avoidance of places where panic attacks have occurred in the past, and physical symptoms during an attack, such as a pounding or racing heart, sweating, breathing problems, weakness or dizziness, feeling hot or a cold chill, tingly or numb hands, chest pain, or stomach pain." 

As aforementioned, these attacks occur spontaneously, even during sleep. An attack typically peaks at 10 minutes, but the symptoms may endure for a longer period. The panic disorder can be so encompassing that if it materializes in say, an elevator, some with panic disorder may begin to fear elevators in general. It's a crippling condition. Some people become so disabled by the disorder that they cannot participate in daily activities or lead normal lives. About one-third become housebound and it spirals into agoraphobia, and they are only able to confront a feared situation when in the company of a spouse or other trusted individual.  Panic disorder is often accompanied by other  problems, such as depression, drug abuse, or alcoholism. 

Panic disorder affects approximately 6 million American adults and is twice as prevalent in women as men. Panic attacks usually begin in late adolescence or early adulthood, but not everyone who experiences panic attacks will develop panic disorder. Many people have just one attack and never have another. Although it appears to be inherited, panic disorder is highly treatable, usually by using psychotherapy, specifically cognitive therapy, or medicine, and sometimes both. 

Catatonia, because it's so fascinating.

Of all of the disorders that we've studied in class, by far the most fascinating to me is catatonic schizophrenia, or Catatonia. Although we reviewed the symptoms in class, I was still confused as to the actual extent of the disorder.

Here's a quick review of what we learned in class: Schizophrenia is a a disorder characterized by a split from reality that shows itself in disorganized thinking, disturbed perceptions, and inappropriate emotions and actions. Catatonic Schizophrenia is characterized by negative symptoms, or the absence of symptoms. Patients with this disorder have a flat affect and are physically stuck. If you move their arm into one position, it will stay there until you move it somewhere else. They literally cannot and will not move unless you move them.

I did a little research about this disorder and it turns out that there's much more to it than what we learned in class. Let's start with the diagnosis: According to the DSM-IV, a person with Catatonic must have at least two of the following: motor immobility, excessive motor activity (what?),  extreme negativism, oddities in voluntary movement including grimacing, and echolalia and echopraxia, or involuntary repetition of another's words or actions.

Let's go back to the part where catatonic schizophrenia can be characterized by excessive movement. There are actually three subtypes within the broad heading of Catatonia. The first type is stupor, which is the type we learned about in class. It is also known as Kahlbaum Syndrome. There is no movement and no response to external stimuli. These patients generally don't make eye contact and are mute. The second type is catatonic excitement, or a constant state of purposeless agitation and excitation. These people are extremely hyperactive, but the activity lacks purpose. To quote Wikipedia, "It is commonly cited as one of the most dangerous mental states in psychiatry." The third type is malignant catatonia, which is characterized by the acute onset of excitement, fever, autonomic instability, and delirium. This type of catatonia may be fatal. Most frighteningly, symptoms of Catatonia, especially catatonic excitement, have been recognized in people with autism spectrum disorders.

Here's a video about this disorder. BE WARNED: the hallucination part of the video is pretty frightening. Also, forgive the colloquialisms. I'm pretty sure this was a school project.

I stand by my answer to Mrs. Perl's question. What is the worst disorder to have? 

Catatonic Schizophrenia. 

Do you agree of disagree? Does the fact that some of these symptoms may appear in those with autism make this disorder even more frightening? Why or why not?

Treating Ornithophobia

So, I have this fear (see previous blogpost), and now we need to know how to treat it. There are many types of therapy that I could undergo, but only one or two would really be the most effective.

First, cognitive-behavioral therapy. This will change my thoughts from negative ones about birds, to more positive ones about birds. It will also reverse my classically conditioned thoughts about birds. The therapist will help me overcome milestones in interacting with bird. Like first he will make me look at a picture of a bird, and by the end of it, I will be able to have a bird stand on my head. This is the best approach to animal phobias because it really reverses the phobia cognitively and behaviorally.

If the phobia was severe there could be some anti-anxiety drugs I could take, and take the psychopharmacology route. This is when you use medical treatment and medicine to treat a psychological disorder. The drugs will only reduce your fear so you can stand going through therapy.

If anyone has any type of animal phobia, I would suggest this very much!

Ornithophobia

Ornithophobia, otherwise known as bird phobia is something that haunts me every day of my life. I am still trying to figure out if it's an actual phobia though. Why am I questioning it, because when I go to the zoo and have to walk past any bird cage I scream and freak out, but when I am just outside walking around and there is a little bird, I don't flip out.

Let's explore the causes of Ornithophobia in general. Any animal phobia is usually caused by a negative encounter with that type of animal. My dad tells me that my fear started when Rocky the Red Bird crept up behind me and scared me. After which I wouldn't stop crying for 2 hours straight. (NOT A GOOD TIME) I find this really funny that it could have been a mascot of a bird that conditioned and generalized me to be afraid of all birds. Though there are other sources of Ornithophobia that originate in popculture, I think mine stems from the negative encounter.

How can you tell if someone has Ornithophobia? It's quite simple, they will start to shake, scream and run at the sight of a bird, but it can depend on severity of your phobia.

Believe it or not, people with severe Ornithophobia can easily become Agorophobic because there are birds everywhere which would make the person scared and anxious everywhere they go. This could eventually cause them to stay indoors for the rest of their life.

Though I don't have quite the most severe form of Ornithophobia, I do have it to some extent. DO YOU HAVE ANY PHOBIAS?

Psycho-Pharmacology: My One and Only?

         This week in AP Psychology, we began to discuss the many methods of dealing with psychological disorders. Now that we've actually learned what each disorder is all about, it's important to see how they're treated. While listing and explaining each type of therapy would be riveting for everyone, I decided to focus more on psycho-pharmacology. Like everything else, the therapy world contains a bio-psycho-social approach. To deal with the biological aspect, you would probably need some sort of medicine to counteract whatever has gone wrong physically. That is where psycho-pharmacology, using medicine or drugs to treat psychological disorders, comes in.

         There are four classes of drugs that one uses to treat different psychological disorders. For psychotic disorders, such as schizophrenia, there are anti-psychotic drugs. These drugs dampen your response to irrelevant stimuli by blocking or stimulating neurotransmitter receptor sites. For paranoid schizophrenia, you might take chloropromazine or thorazine, which block dopamine receptor sites so excess dopamine cannot be used and prevent positive stimuli, such as hallucinations. Along with every drug comes side effects, and anti-psychotic drugs are no exception. Side effects include: tremors, sluggishness, twitches, and tardive dyskinesia (involuntary movement of limbs).

         To act against anxiety, one would use anti-anxiety drugs, which depress central nervous system activity. These drugs include xanax, ativan, valium, and benzodiazapine. This drug can produce physical dependence, as you become dependent on the drug to stop the symptoms of constant nervous system arousal. Another class of drugs, antidepressants, can also counteract anxiety symptoms. They increase the availability of serotonin and norepinephrine. One such drug would be SSRI, the Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor, which acts as an agonist for serotonin. Others would be prozac, zoloft, and paxil. These drugs help with anxiety as well because they stop the arousal neurotransmitters from manifesting.

         The last class of drugs, mood stabilizers, do just that: they stabilize the mood. These drugs would be used for bipolar disorder to stop the up and down swinging of bipolar disorder. One such drug would be lithium.

         With using one method comes the argument that another should be used instead. For the therapies that don't focus on the biological aspects of disorders, psycho-pharmacology would not be used. But is it better to use drugs and medicine for medically-based disorders, or should a mixture be used? On huffingtonpost.com, Michael Tansey, a psychologist from Chicago advocates first for psychotherapy, then for both psychotherapy and psycho-pharmacology, then only psycho-pharmacology, then neither.

         When advocating for only psycho-pharmacology, Tansey describes a scenario with someone who has a biologically based disorder. He says that for someone like this, it is better to see a psycho-pharmacologist, who would regularly check up on how the medication is working, see how the side effects are impacting life, and then adjust if necessary. Were they to only receive a quick prescription from an internist without a follow-up, a disdain for psychotherapy and medication may grow.

Link to article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-j-tansey/psychotherapy-medication-_b_4981790.html

Therapy

This week we talked a lot about therapy. The different types of therapy include:

Psychoanalysis: It's based on the Freudian belief that our behaviors are driven by unconscious drive and forces. They believe that anxiety is a conflict between the id and the supergo. The goal of this form of therapy is to try and bring repressed memories to the surface. The therapy is very costly and involves the therapist staying out of sight and using the practice of free association (saying whatever comes to mind continuously). The therapist uses the resistance (pausing between words) to find the things that bring shame. What often happens is transference (they transfer feelings about something to the therapist). They also perform dream analysis - the idea is that their dreams give access to the patient's unconscious.

Psychodynamic approach: This form of therapy is face-to-face and is what we are thinking of when we classically think of therapy. They don't think that it's all about uncovering repressed memories. They focus on uncovering the things that affected the past, they want to talk about it. They realize that the past impacts the present and the goal is to solve the present problems by looking at the past. They focus on interpersonal psychotherapy - they're not going to delve into the patient's childhood, they're going to look at the current relationships.

Humanistic approach: Humanism focuses on the ideas of self-actualization, being positive, being growth-oriented, the fact that people are good, and the merging of the perceived self and the ideal self. The humanistic approach thinks that by the therapist disclosing something about themselves, they can help the patient. They practice insight therapy - trying to give advise; and client-centered therapy - the focus is on the client and the present, they want to elicit ideas from the client. They use active listening, where they mirror back what the client is saying and always have unconditional positive regard - they always find the good in people.

Behavioral therapy: Behaviorists define behavior as an observable behavior. The goal is to change behavior - not looking into the past. They use classical and operant conditioning to achieve this. Through classical conditioning, they use things like exposure therapy (continuous exposure to the problem), to systematically desensitize the patient to the problem. The goal is to repeatedly pair the neutral stimulus with progressive relaxation and it will eventually extinguish the response. Aversive conditioning replaces the behavior by pairing it with something negative. Operant conditioning reinforces or punishes to change the behavior. By using a token economy (using a prize to act as money) therapists can reinforce behavior.

Cognitive therapy: Cognitive therapy will only work if depression comes from a cognitive approach. Cognitive therapy aims to look at a person's thought pattern, and wants to change that pattern.

Cognitive-behavior therapy: This approach combines behavioral and cognitive therapy. Their goal is to address thoughts, emotions, and behaviors -- because they all influence your life.

Group and family therapy: this type of therapy is of the opinion that an individual might gain more insight by seeing what others say. They think that sometimes there are issues that affect an entire group or a family, and can be helped if discussed together.

Ecclectic approach: This approach takes the opinion 'one approach isn't good.' The more you use the better! The best way to solve a problem is to pull from a variety of sources.


I don't know which I think is best. I think that it really depends on the situation.. Maybe that would mean I like the ecclectic approach best?? Which approach do you think is most effective?