Psychology Abnormal Option for ERQ’s

Prevalence Rates describe the proportion of people in a population that is diagnosed + used to better understand the nature of a disorder and who it affects. However, there are many factors that may affect prevalence rates, meaning that they often aren’t reliable. Period prevalence is the proportion of people in a given population in a given time interval. Furthermore, the Point Prevalence of a Disorder is the proportion of people in a given population that are currently diagnosed with a disorder.

• Cultural Differences: affect the expression of symptoms → if diagnosed using a certain approach (western approach) may lead to misdiagnosis.

• Globalization: this may change the perspective of someone on a disorder, which can also affect the prevalence rates.

• Reporting Bias: various cultures have different opinions on what is shameful + the presence of stigma around certain disorders → affect the prevalence rates

Theory of Genetic Vulnerability

This theory argues that depression can be explained using a genetic perspective (mostly by utilizing twin studies!!), specifically, that an illness may be the result of having a certain gene that makes you extra vulnerable to that illness. However, importantly, this theory claims that it is not solely the gene that will cause an illness, as the gene must also be expressed, which may occur through environmental stressors.

Limitations

• Correlational in Nature as it wouldn’t be ethical to manipulate genes & gene pools → no cause-and-effect relationship can be established.

• Twin Studies introduce the problem of population validity as they don’t necessarily represent the general population.

Strengths

• Twin studies have been shown to be very reliable; they control for the majority of genetic differences.

• Research considerss environmental stressors as well, meaning it’s more holistic in nature.

Theory of Beck’s Cognitive Triad

This theory argues that depression is caused by a person’s “automatic thoughts”, which are triggered by a specific stimulus. These thoughts tend to be negative self-schemas, which could be developed due to family issues, social rejection, or poor school experiences. They are activated when someone is put in a similar situation as the one in the schema developed. Beck argues that there are 6 types of faulty thinking:

• Arbitrary Inference: drawing conclusions based on little to no evidence.

• Dichotomous Thinking: having an all-or-nothing approach to the world.

• Exaggeration: overestimating the significance of an event.

• Overgeneralization: applying an incident to all similar ones.

• Personalization: assuming someone’s behavior is done to purposefully hurt you.

• Selective Abstraction: forming conclusions without looking at the whole picture.

Limitations

• There is a question of bidirectional ambiguity as it is difficult to tell whether negative thinking causes the onset of depression, or if rather is a symptom of depression.

• The research also tends to be correlational in nature, meaning a cause-and-effect relationship can’t be established.

• Furthermore, research could struggle separating the cognitive factors from biological/social factors.

Strengths

• Treatment has been developed based on this theory (CBT) which seems to be an effective treatment for depression.

• These thinking patterns are confirmed to be present in people with depression.

• Generally, research tends to be longitudinal, prospective research.

Theory of Vulnerability Models

This theory focuses on how environmental factors play an impact on the onset of depression, and creates models containing protective factors, vulnerability factors and provoking agents to help identify what causes the onset of depression.

• Protective Factors: these factors decrease the risk of depression

• Vulnerability Factors: these factors increase the risk of depression

• Provoking Agents: factors that cause ongoing and acute stress.

Limitations

• Research tends to be correlational in nature.

• Research also approaches stress in a problematic way, measuring it using the Social Readjustment Ranking Scale, which ranks different life events by how stressful they are. However, it doesn’t consider how a person reacts to the event, just the event itself, meaning it likely isn’t an accurate measure.

• Tend to be case studies, making them more difficult to generalize.

Strengths

• Helps understand the relationship between our physiology, how we respond to stress, and the onset of depression.

• May help prevent disorders by utilizing protective factors for people at risk.

(1) Natural Experiment: Capsi et al

This is when the independent variable occurs naturally and is outside the researchers control. Participants are also not randomly allocated into groups, and are rather grouped based on the independent variable. This experiment can’t determine causation, and can only establish a causal relationship.

(2) Semi-Structured Interviews: Brown and Harris

Specific Questions are asked to gather information, that help shape the conversation. However, the research may choose to go more in-depth about a certain topic or ask follow-up questions to gather better information about a topic. However, these conversations can be somewhat artificial, lowering their ecological validity.

Compare:

• Both are correlational in nature, meaning they can’t establish a cause-and-effect relationships. However, SSI’s could succeed here if method triangulation is used.

• In both cases, participants are not randomly allocated

Contrast:

• Natural Experiment generally have high ecological validity, whilst SSI’s don’t.

• Generally, Natural experiments have low internal validity as they have no control over the environment, however SSI’s have higher internal validity.