Key Psychological Studies (Psychopathology)

Mowrer (1947) proposed the two-process model to explain how phobias are learnt through classical conditioning and operant conditioning.

Classical conditioning: Waston & Raynor (1920) created a phobia in an 11-month baby called 'Little Albert'. He showed no anxiety initally then when he saw a white rat, an iron bar was struck with a hammer behind Albert's head. The noise was the unconditioned stimulus (US), creating an unconditioned response (UR). The rat (neutral stimulus (NS)) then is associated with the US and becomes a conditioned stimulus (CS), creating a conditioned response (CR). Albert had then generalised his fear with white furry objects.

Operant conditioning: is when our behaviour is reinforced, which increase the frequency of the behaviour. Mowrer suggested when a phobic stimulus is avoided, it reduces the fear associated and reinforces the avoidance behaviour, so the phobia is maintained.

It explains how phobias could be maintained and helped developments in therapies because it explains why the patient needds to be exposed to the fear stimulus.

Alternative explainations for avoidance: avoidance reduce anxiety and results in positive feeling of safety- explaining why people remain indoors.

Systematic desensitisation is a behavioural therapy that gradually redcues phobic anxiety through classical conditioning. This is done by introducing a new phobic stimulus with relaxation methods instead of anxiety- this is called counterconditioning. It's also impossible to be scared and relaxed simultaneously, so one emotion prevents another, which is called reciporal inhibition.

1. The anxiety hierachy is a list of situations related to the phobic stimulus in order from least to most frightnening.

2. Relaxation is when the therapist teaches the patient way to relax or alternatively, relaxtion can be achieved using drugs like Valium.

3. Exposure is when the patient is exposed to the phobic stimulus whilst in a relaxed state. This occurs across several sessions and begins with the least frightening to most.

It's acceptable to patients because it doesn't cause the same degree of trauma as well as cost-effective.

It's a slow process and may not be as effective for different kinds of phobia.

Ellis (1962) suggested a cognitive explanation to depression that proposed that good mental health is due to rational thinking. He used the ABC Model to explain how irrational thoughts affected our beahviour and emotional state.

A- Activating event: when irrational thoughts are triggered by an external event.

B- Belief about event: whether the beliefs are rational or irrational.

C- Consequences of the belief: these consequences are emotional/ behavioural that trigger depression.

It has lead to successful developments in CBT as it's used as research evidence.

It's a partial explanation as it explains how depression occurs but doesn't explain the cause (reactive depression).

It doesn't explain the anger associated with depression or why patients suffer from halluvinations/delusions.

Beck (1967) suggested a cognitive explanation to why some people are more vulnerable to depression.

1. Faulty information processing- fundamental errors in logic/ selectively focus on the negative aspects/ blow small things out of proportion.

2. Negative self schemas (a group of ides/ info. that's developed with experience)- depressed people have negative self schemas.

3. The negative triad- negative view of self, world and the future/ pessimisstic/ maladaptive responses (struggle to adapt)

Beck's cognitive explanation formed the basis of CBT because the elements are easily identifiable.

It dosen't explain the cause of the depression.

Beck's theory neatly explains the basics of depression but because it's a complex mental disorder, it's not generalisable to all types of people.

Weissman & Beck (1978) investigated whether depresed people have a negative self schema, which is a negative perception of self or negative information we hold against ourselves.

The participants thought process was measured onthe Dysfunctional Attitude Scale (DAS).

They measured their thought proces through asking the participants to do a questionnaire with whether they agreed or disagreed with the statemen presented to them.

Most depressed people would respond in a pessimisstic fashion, so that would relate to their perception of themselves and therefore their negative self schemas.

Nestate et al. (2000) compared a control group with 80 patients with OCD and 343 relatives and found that people with OCD were x5 more likely to have it if a first degree had it also.

Billet et al. (1998) did a meta-analysis (combines research from other studies) of 14 twin studies and found that indentical twins were x2 more likely to develop OCD than non-identical twins.

Ozaki et al. (2003) did an investigation on a mutation of the SERT gene (gene that controls the transport of sertonin) on two unrelated families and found that 6/7 family members had OCD.

Scezchtman et al. (1998) found that when he gave high doeses of dopamine-enhancing drug induces compulsive movements or behaviours found in OCD patients.

Pigott et al (1992) found that antidepressants that increase serotonin activity is seen to reduce OCD activity.