Abnormal psychology is a branch of psychology that studies, diagnoses, and treats

unusual patterns of behavior, emotions, and thoughts that could signify a mental
disorder.

Abnormal psychology studies people who are “abnormal” or “atypical” compared to the
members of a given society.

Remember, “abnormal” in this context does not necessarily imply “negative” or “bad.” It
is a term used to describe behaviors and mental processes that significantly deviate
from statistical or societal norms.

Abnormal psychology research is pivotal for understanding and managing mental health
issues, developing treatments, and promoting mental health awareness.

Defining Abnormality

The definition of the word abnormal is simple enough, but applying this to psychology
poses a complex problem:

What is normal? Whose norm? For what age? For what culture?

The concept of abnormality is imprecise and di icult to define. Examples of

abnormality can take many di erent forms and involve di erent features, so that, what
at first sight seem quite reasonable definitions, turns out to be quite problematic.

There are several di erent ways in which it is possible to define ‘abnormal’ as opposed
to our ideas of what is ‘normal.’

Statistical Infrequency

Under this definition of abnormality, a person’s trait, thinking or behavior is classified as

abnormal if it is rare or statistically unusual.

With this definition, it is necessary to be clear about how rare a trait or behavior needs
to be before we class it as abnormal. For instance, one may say that an individual who
has an IQ below or above the average level of IQ in society is abnormal.
Strength

The statistical approach helps to address what is meant by normal in a statistical

context. It helps us make cut–o points in terms of diagnosis.

Limitations

However, this definition fails to distinguish between desirable and undesirable behavior.
For example, obesity is statistically normal but not associated with healthy or desirable.
Conversely, a high IQ is statistically abnormal but may well be regarded as highly
desirable.

Many rare behaviors or characteristics (e.g., left-handedness) have no bearing on

normality or abnormality. Some characteristics are regarded as abnormal even though
they are quite frequent.

Depression may a ect 27% of elderly people (NIMH, 2001). This would make it
common, but that does not mean it isn’t a problem.

The decision of where to start the “abnormal” classification is arbitrary. Who decides
what is statistically rare, and how do they decide? For example, if an IQ of 70 is the cut-
o point, how can we justify saying someone with 69 is abnormal, and someone with 70
is normal?

This definition also implies that abnormal behavior in people should be rare or
statistically unusual, which is not the case.

Instead, any specific abnormal behavior may be unusual, but it is not unusual for
people to exhibit some form of prolonged abnormal behavior at some point in their
lives, and mental disorders such as depression are very statistically common.

Violation of Social Norms

Violation of social norms is a definition of abnormality where a person’s thinking or

behavior is classified as abnormal if it violates the (unwritten) rules about what is
expected or acceptable behavior in a particular social group. Their behavior may be
incomprehensible to others or make others feel threatened or uncomfortable.

Every culture has certain standards for acceptable behavior or socially acceptable
norms.

Norms are expected ways of behaving in a society according to the majority, and those
members of a society who do not think and behave like everyone else break these
norms and are often defined as abnormal.

With this definition, it is necessary to consider the degree to which a norm is violated,
the importance of that norm, and the value attached by the social group to di erent
sorts of violations, e.g., is the violation rude, eccentric, abnormal, or criminal?

There are a number of influences on social norms that need to be taken into account
when considering the definition of the social norm:

Di erent cultures and subcultures are going to have di erent social norms.

Culture For example, it is common in Southern Europe to stand much closer to strangers than in
pitch and volume, touching, the direction of gaze, and acceptable subjects for discussio
found to vary between cultures.

At any one time, a type of behavior might be considered normal, whereas, at another tim
Context and behavior could be abnormal, depending on both context and situation.
Situation For example, wearing a chicken suit in the street for a charity event would seem normal,
chicken suit for everyday activities, such as shopping or going to church, would be socia

Time must also be taken into account, as what is considered abnormal at one time in on
Historical normal at another time, even in the same culture.
Context For example, one hundred years ago, a pregnancy outside of marriage was considered a
illness, and some women were institutionalized, whereas now this is not the case

Di erent people can behave in the same way, and some will be normal and others abnor
Age and on age and gender (and sometimes other factors).
Gender For example, a man wearing a dress and high heels may be considered socially abnorma
not expect it, whereas this is expected of women

With this definition, it is necessary to consider the following:

1. The degree to which a norm is violated,

 2. The importance of that norm,

3. The value attached by the social group to di erent sorts of violations, e.g., is the
violation rude, eccentric, abnormal, or criminal?

Limitations

The most obvious problem with defining abnormality using social norms is that there is
no universal agreement
over social norms.

Social norms are culturally specific – they can di er significantly from one generation to
the next and between di erent ethnic, regional, and socio-economic groups.

In some societies, such as the Zulu, for example, hallucinations and screaming in the
street are regarded as normal behavior.

Social norms also exist within a time frame and therefore change over time. Behavior
that was once seen as abnormal may, given time, become acceptable and vice versa.

For example, drunk driving was once considered acceptable but is now seen as socially
unacceptable, whereas homosexuality has gone the other way.

Until 1980 homosexuality was considered a psychological disorder by the World Health
Organization (WHO), but today is socially acceptable.

Social norms can also depend on the situation or context we find ourselves in. Is it
normal to eat parts of a dead body?

In 1972 a rugby team who survived a plane crash in the snow-capped Andes of South
America found themselves without food and in sub-freezing temperatures for 72 days.
To survive, they ate the bodies of those who had died in the crash.

Failure to Function Adequately

Failure to function adequately is a definition of abnormality where a person is

considered abnormal if they are unable to cope with the demands of everyday life, or
experience personal distress.

They may be unable to perform the behaviors necessary for day-to-day living, e.g., self-
care, holding down a job, interacting meaningfully with others, making themselves
understood, etc.

Rosenhan & Seligman (1989) suggest the following characteristics that define failure to
function adequately:

 Su ering

 Maladaptiveness (danger to self)

  Vividness & unconventionality (stands out)

 Unpredictably & a loss of control

 Irrationality/incomprehensibility

 Causes observer discomfort

 Violates moral/social standards

Limitations

One limitation of this definition is that apparently abnormal behavior may actually be
helpful, functional, and adaptive for the individual.

For example, a person who has the obsessive-compulsive disorder of hand-washing

may find that the behavior makes him cheerful, happy, and better able to cope with his
day.

Many people engage in behavior that is maladaptive/harmful or threatening to self, but

we don’t class them as abnormal:

 Adrenaline sports

 Smoking, drinking alcohol

 Skipping classes

Deviation from Ideal Mental Health

Abnormality can be defined as a deviation from ideal mental health.

This means that rather than defining what is abnormal, psychologists define what
normal/ideal mental health is, and anything that deviates from this is regarded as
abnormal.

This requires us to decide on the characteristics we consider necessary for mental

health. Jahoda (1958) defined six criteria by which mental health could be measured:

 A positive view of the self

 Capability for growth and development

 Autonomy and independence

 Accurate perception of reality

 Positive friendships and relationships

 Environmental mastery – able to meet the varying demands of day-to-day

situations
According to this approach, the more satisfied these criteria are, the healthier the
individual is.

Limitations

It is practically impossible for any individual to achieve all of the ideal characteristics all
of the time. For example, a person might not be the ‘master of his environment’ but be
happy with his situation.

The absence of this criterion of ideal mental health hardly indicates he is su ering from
a mental disorder.

Ethnocentric

Ethnocentrism, in the context of psychology, refers to the tendency to view one’s own
culture or ethnic group as the standard or norm, and to judge other cultures, values,
behaviors, and beliefs based on those norms. I

White, middle-class men devise most definitions of psychological abnormality. It has

been suggested that this may lead to disproportionate numbers of people from certain
groups being diagnosed as “abnormal.”

For example, in the UK, depression is more commonly identified in women, and black
people are more likely than their white counterparts to be diagnosed with
schizophrenia.

Similarly, working-class people are more likely to be diagnosed with a mental illness
than those from non-manual backgrounds.

Models of Abnormality
Behavioral Model of Abnormality

Behaviorists believe that our actions are determined largely by the experiences we have
in life rather than by the underlying pathology of unconscious forces.

Abnormality is therefore seen as the development of behavior patterns that are

considered maladaptive (i.e., harmful) for the individual.

Behaviorism states that all behavior (including abnormal) is learned from the
environment (nurture) and that all behavior that has been learned can also be ‘unlearnt’
(which is how abnormal behavior is treated).

The behavioral approach emphasizes the environment and how abnormal behavior is
acquired through classical conditioning, operant conditioning, and social learning.

Classical conditioning has been said to account for the development of phobias. The
feared object (e.g., spider or rat) is associated with fear or anxiety sometime in the past.
The conditioned stimulus subsequently evokes a powerful fear response characterized
by avoidance of the feared object and the emotion of fear whenever the object is
encountered.

Learning environments can reinforce (re: operant conditioning) problematic behaviors.

E.g., an individual may be rewarded for having panic attacks by receiving attention from
family and friends – this would lead to the behavior being reinforced and increasing in
later life.

Our society can also provide deviant maladaptive models that children identify with and
imitate (re: social learning theory).
Cognitive Perspective of Mental Health Behavior

The cognitive approach assumes that a person’s thoughts are responsible for their
behavior. The model deals with how information is processed in the brain and the
impact of this on behavior.

The basic assumptions are:

 Maladaptive behavior is caused by faulty and irrational cognitions.

 It is the way you think about a problem rather than the problem itself that causes
mental disorders.

 Individuals can overcome mental disorders by learning to use more appropriate

cognitions.

The individual is an active processor of information.

How a person perceives, anticipates, and evaluates events rather than the events
themselves, which will have an impact on behavior.

This is generally believed to be an automatic process; in other words, we do not think

about it.

In people with psychological problems, these thought processes tend to be negative,

and the cognitions (i.e., attributions, cognitive errors) made will be inaccurate:

These cognitions cause distortions in how we see things; Ellis suggested it is through
irrational thinking, while Beck proposed the cognitive triad.

Medical / Biological Perspective of Mental Health Behavior

The medical model of psychopathology believes that disorders have an organic or

physical cause. The focus of this approach is on genetics, neurotransmitters,
neurophysiology, neuroanatomy, biochemistry, etc.

For example, in terms of biochemistry – the dopamine hypothesis argues that elevated
levels of dopamine are related to symptoms of schizophrenia.

The approach argues that mental disorders are related to the physical structure and
functioning of the brain.

For example, di erences in brain structure (abnormalities in the frontal and pre-frontal
cortex, enlarged ventricles) have been identified in people with schizophrenia.

The Diathesis-Stress Model

According to the diathesis-stress model, the emergence of a psychological disorder

requires first the existence of a diathesis, or an innate predisposition to that disorder in
an individual, and second, stress, or a set of challenging life circumstances which then
trigger the development of the disorder.

In the diathesis-stress model, these challenging life events are thought to interact with
individuals’ innate dispositions to bring psychological disorders to the surface.

For example, traumatic early life experiences, such as the loss of a parent, can act as
longstanding predispositions to a psychological disorder. In addition, personality traits
like high neuroticism are sometimes also referred to as diatheses.

Furthermore, individuals with greater innate predispositions to a disorder may require

less stress for that disorder to be triggered, and vice versa.

In this way, the diathesis-stress model explains how psychological disorders might be
related to both nature and nurture and how those two components might interact with
one another (Broerman, 2017).

Psychodynamic Perspective of Mental Health Behavior

The main assumptions include Freud’s belief that abnormality came from psychological
causes rather than physical causes, that unresolved conflicts between the id, ego, and
superego can all contribute to abnormality, for example:

 Weak ego: Well-adjusted people have a strong ego that can cope with the
demands of both the id and the superego by allowing each to express itself at
appropriate times. If the ego is weakened, then either the id or the superego,
whichever is stronger, may dominate the personality.

 Unchecked id impulses: If id impulses are unchecked, they may be expressed

in self-destructive and immoral behavior. This may lead to disorders such as
conduct disorders in childhood and psychopathic [dangerously abnormal]
behavior in adulthood.

 Too powerful superego: A superego that is too powerful, and therefore too harsh
and inflexible in its moral values, will restrict the id to such an extent that the
person will be deprived of even socially acceptable pleasures. According to
Freud, this would create neurosis, which could be expressed in the symptoms
of anxiety disorders, such as phobias and obsessions.
Freud also believed that early childhood experiences and unconscious motivation were
responsible for disorders.
An Alternative View: Mental Illness is a Social Construction

Since the 1960s, it has been argued by anti-psychiatrists that the entire notion of
abnormality or mental disorder is merely a social construction used by society.

Notable anti-psychiatrists were Michel Foucault, R.D. Laing, Thomas Szasz, and Franco
Basaglia. Some observations made are:

 Mental illness is a social construct created by doctors. An illness must be an

objectively demonstrable biological pathology, but psychiatric disorders are not.

 The criteria for mental illness are vague, subjective, and open to
misinterpretation criteria.

 The medical profession uses various labels, e.g., depressed and schizophrenic,
to exclude those whose behavior fails to conform to society’s norms.

 Labels and treatment can be used as a form of social control and represent an
abuse of power.

 Diagnosis raises issues of medical and ethical integrity because of financial and
professional links with pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies.
5 Module 5: Memory

Memory plays a key role in many areas of our lives, not the least of which is school. To
understand why we remember and forget, you need to consider the entire memory
process. Here’s a very simple description: First, you have to get information into your
memory systems; call this process encoding. When you need to get information out of
memory (for example, when you are taking an exam, or telling a story), you use the
process called retrieval. In between encoding and retrieval we have, of course,
memory storage.

Figure 5.1: Memory Processes: Encoding,

Storage, and Retrieval

Failure to remember information—that is, forgetting—can occur because of a

breakdown at any of the three points (encoding, storage, retrieval). The typical culprits
in the failure to remember, however, are encoding and retrieval problems. That’s why
most of this module is devoted to encoding and retrieval. But first you need to
understand the basic layout of memory, which is a key element of cognition.

This module breaks psychologists’ basic understanding of memory into six sections.
First it explains that not all forms of memory are alike and describes some of the
di erent memory systems. The section introduces principles of encoding and explains
how recoding is one of the keys to e ective memory. The third section describes the
processes that take place in the brain when information is encoded and stored in
memory. The fourth section covers memory retrieval. The final section describes how
memories are constructed and, sometimes, distorted.

5.1 Memory Systems

5.2 Encoding and Recoding

5.3 Memory Storage and Memory in the Brain

5.4 Memory Retrieval

5.5 Memory Construction and Distortion

encoding: putting information into memory systems

retrieval: taking information out of memory systems

storage: keeping memories in the brain for future use

READING WITH PURPOSE

Remember and Understand

By reading and studying Module 5, you should be able to remember and describe:

 Distinctions among encoding, storage, and retrieval (5 introduction)

 Characteristics of sensory memory, working memory, and long-term memory

(5.1)

 Characteristics of procedural memory and declarative memory (5.1)

 Methods of rehearsal for encoding: repetition, auditory encoding, semantic

encoding (5.2)

 Strategies for semantic encoding: elaborative verbal rehearsal, self reference,

mental images (5.2)

 Organizing to encode (5.3)

 Concept map and neural networks (5.4)

 Parts of a neuron: axon, dendrites, cell body (5.4)

 Synaptic plasticity (5.4)

 Retrieval cues (5.5)

 Memory distortion (5.6)

Apply

By reading and thinking about how the concepts in Module 5 apply to real life, you
should be able to:

 Identify di erent kinds of memory (5.1)

 Characterize your own typical study strategies in terms of encoding and retrieval
principles (5.2, 5.3, 5.5)
  Recognize a memory from your own life that might be distorted (5.6)

Analyze, Evaluate, and Create

By reading and thinking about Module 5, participating in classroom activities, and

completing out-of-class assignments, you should be able to:

 Devise a strategy for studying that uses encoding and retrieval principles (5.2,
5.3, 5.5)

 Recognize a situation in which you would suspect a memory distortion (5.6)

5.1 Memory Systems

Activate

 Can you think of more than one kind of memory that you have drawn upon?

 Why can you remember a birthday party you attended years ago, but forget what
your instructor said seconds ago?

 Is it true that some memories can last a lifetime?

 Is it true that “you never forget how to ride a bicycle?”

When you first start to think about it, memory might seem pretty simple. But consider
some of the memories you might have:

 What you had for breakfast this morning

 Your 10th birthday party

 The address someone just left on your voicemail

 Your phone number

 What your best friend looks like

 What a cat is

 How to read

 What you read in section 1.2 of this book

 The answer to question 3 on your History mid-term

 The name of the person you just met

 How to do a cartwheel
All of these phenomena are, at their core, memories, which means that they share
some fundamental properties. Yet they have significant di erences, too. It has been a
major accomplishment of memory researchers to describe the di erent types of
memory systems and processes, and determine the specific properties of each one.

Distinguishing by duration and purpose of the memory

We have two major memory systems that help to explain how memories are stored:
working memory (sometimes referred to as short-term memory, although the actual
meaning is not identical) and long-term memory. The process of creating a memory that
you will remember for a test you will be taking next week and beyond involves both
systems working together.

Figure 5.2: The interaction between working

memory and long-term memory

Soon after information is first encountered, it enters the system called working memory,
simply by virtue of the fact that you pay attention to it (Baddeley and Hitch, 1974). The
best way to understand working memory is to think of it as the current contents of your
consciousness—that is, whatever you are thinking about right now. So as you are sitting
at your desk staring at a textbook, the words that you pay attention to enter into working
memory. You hold information in working memory either because you are going to use it
(for example, to solve some problem) or because you will be trying to transfer, or encode
it, into long-term memory.

Long-term memory is the memory system that holds information for periods of time
ranging from a few minutes to many years. If you do not use or transfer the information
in working memory into long-term memory, it will be forgotten, probably in less than
thirty seconds (Peterson & Peterson, 1959).

One fact you should realize about working memory is that its capacity is limited.
Psychologists had thought that people can generally hold about 7 pieces, or chunks, of
information in working memory at one time (Miller, 1956). A chunk is a unit of
meaningful information. For example, an individual letter might be a chunk. If the letters
can be ordered to form words or abbreviations, then these are the chunks. More
recently, however, researchers have proposed that memory capacity is a function of
time, not quantity. Specifically, our working memory may hold the amount of
information that we can process in about two seconds (Baddeley, 1986, 1996).
If you manage to get the information from working memory encoded into long-term
memory, it is possible that you can retain that information for many years. It can even
last a lifetime; picture a 92 year-old grandmother who still tells stories about her
childhood in Italy. Also, although that “I can’t study any more because my brain is full”
feeling may make you think otherwise, you can essentially store a limitless amount of
information in long-term memory (Landauer, 1986).

One of the keys to good memory, then, is to have e ective strategies for encoding
information into long-term memory (see section 5.2). You typically store the general
meaning of information in long-term memory, however, rather than precisely what you
encountered (Brewer, 1977).

Working memory and long-term memory are not the only two memory storage systems.
Another one is called sensory memory, and it actually comes into play before working
memory does (Sperling, 1960; Crowder & Morton, 1969). Sensory memory is an
extremely accurate, very short duration system. It essentially stores the information
taken in by the senses, vision and hearing, just long enough (about a second) to allow
you to direct attention to it so you can get the information into working memory.

Distinguishing by the kind of information in the memory

Procedural Memory

This ability to do a backflip is a skill, or a memory, like riding a bicycle, tying one’s shoes,
or hitting a tennis ball. These types of memories, however, seem very di erent from
remembering what you had for dinner last night or remembering that Albany is the
capital of New York.

Psychologists, too, have noticed this distinction and have given the two kinds of
memories di erent names. Procedural memory refers to skills and procedures. These
are memories for things that you can do. Declarative memory refers to facts and
episodes (Cohen & Eichenbaum, 1993). Declarative memory is further subdivided
into semantic memory—your general store of knowledge, such as facts and word
meanings, and episodic memory— memory for events, or episodes from your life. So, if
you remember that Bismarck is the capital of North Dakota, it is semantic memory,
unless you remember the exact time that you learned this fact (in 5th grade social
studies, for example), in which case it would be episodic memory. So you see, as the
details about when we first learned some piece of information fade, episodic memories
can become semantic memory.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=8Ik57i3e7NE

Declarative Memory
Procedural memory seems to operate by di erent rules than declarative memory. For
example, when we talk about transferring information from working memory to long-
term memory (encoding) and retrieving information from long-term memory back into
working memory, we are talking about declarative memory only. There is no working
memory for procedures. Acquiring a procedural memory typically takes much more
practice than acquiring a declarative memory does. But once a skill is acquired (that is,
once it becomes part of your procedural memory), it may well be there to stay. So, at
least for some people, it is probably true that you never forget how to ride a bicycle.

(See Module 9 for a related distinction called explicit and implicit memory)

chunk: a unit of meaningful information

declarative memory: memory for facts and episodes

episodic memory: the part of declarative memory that refers to specific events or
episodes from someone’s life

long-term memory: an essentially unlimited, nearly permanent memory storage

system

procedural memory: memory for skills and procedures

semantic memory: the part of declarative memory that refers to one’s general store of
knowledge

sensory memory: a very short (about one second), extremely accurate memory system
that holds information long enough for an individual to pay attention to it

working memory: a short-term memory storage system that holds information in

consciousness for immediate use or to transfer it into long long-term memory

Debrief

 Think about the last time you forgot something. Was the forgetting a problem
with working memory or long-term memory?

 What is your most interesting procedural memory? Have you ever tried to teach it
to someone else? If so, how did you do it?

 What is your earliest declarative memory? (Use an episode from your life rather
than trying to figure out the first fact that you learned.) Do you think that your
declarative memory is good or poor?

5.2 Recode to Encode

Activate
  Have you ever finished reading a short section from a textbook and immediately
realized that you have already forgotten what you just read?

 Have you ever looked at the first question on an exam for which you thought you
had studied well and thought, “I have never seen this concept before in my life;
am I in the right room?”

 Do you find yourself able to remember unimportant material for a class (for
example, material not on the test) and unable to remember important material?

 Please turn to the beginning of Module 5. Notice the description and list of all the
sections that fit within the Module. Now go find a couple of textbooks from your
other classes and look at the outlines in the first pages of some chapters or at
least at the table of contents. (Seriously, go look! We’ll wait.) Why are these
outlines included?

Think about your best friend for a moment. What were they wearing the last time you
were together? You will often find yourself unable to remember information like this.
Why? Because you probably never attempted to encode that information from working
memory into long-term memory. You didn’t look at your friend and say, “Lisa looks so
good today; I’m going to remember what she is wearing!”

Certainly, information sometimes makes it into long-term memory without you engaging
in purposeful encoding. Perhaps you have an annoying song going through your head
right now. It is not very likely that when you first heard the song, you said to yourself,
“Hey, I better make sure I memorize this song.” (You might be interested to know that
psychologists have studied this phenomenon of annoying songs you cannot get out of
your head. They call them earworms –see Jakubowski et al. 2017). But do not count on
this accidental encoding to provide you with a solid memory when you need it. The
simple truth is if you want to be able to retrieve information from long-term memory, you
have to do a very good job of putting it in there in the first place.

How do you e ectively encode information into long-term memory?

The basic strategy that people use to encode information from working memory into
long-term memory is rehearsal. All of the encoding strategies in this module are kinds
of rehearsal. The simplest kind of rehearsal is straight repetition. Imagine trying to learn
your French vocabulary words by mentally running through the vocabulary list over and
over until you get them all right. It works ok, as long as the test was soon after you finish
studying (about 15 seconds seems to be the ideal delay; anything more than that and
you start forgetting). Although it may be one of the most common rehearsal strategies
and is the one favored by many students, repetition is probably one of the least
e ective. Call this encoding without recoding. And the advice about it bears repeating:
Encoding without recoding (in other words, straight repetition) is a poor way to encode
information from working memory into long-term memory.

One specific situation in which many people have di iculty encoding is when they read
textbooks. Have you ever read a paragraph, realized that you have immediately forgotten
it, and as a consequence decided to re-read it? Often, the problem is that you are
merely reading the words over in your head, making sure you can “hear” yourself silently
saying the words. In this case, you are recoding: transforming the information from one
form into another. But the transformation in this case is minor and not very useful.
Psychologists call it auditory encoding or acoustic encoding. Auditory encoding is ok.
Many students rely on it, and with enough e ort they do fairly well at school.

In order to remember better, however, there is no question that you should try to move
to the next level of recoding, in which you transform the information into something
meaningful. For example, Craik and Tulving (1975) developed the idea of semantic
encoding (Craik & Tulving 1975). Semantic means “meaning,” so semantic encoding
refers to mentally processing the meaning of information. For example, you should pay
attention to patterns and relationships and their significance, rather than just the words
or numbers themselves.

Psychologist F. I. M. Craik and his colleagues demonstrated the benefits of using

semantic encoding in a famous series of experiments during the 1970’s (Craik and
Lockhart, 1972; Craik and Tulving, 1975). These experiments examined what Craik
termed levels of processing. In a typical experiment, participants would read a list of
words with instructions that would encourage one specific type of encoding. The
shallowest encoding strategy (or level of processing) required participants to pay
attention to the visual appearance and shapes of the letters only. For example, a
shallow encoding strategy would be to count how many straight and curved letters there
are in each word. Note that you do not even need to read the words in order to use this
strategy, so it would seem to be quite a poor recoding strategy. Somewhat “deeper”
encoding strategies were those that required participants to pay attention to more
properties of the words, such as the auditory qualities. For example, judging whether
the word rhymes with a specific word is a deeper encoding strategy, an acoustic one.
Note that you do not need to encode the meaning of the words in order to use this
strategy.

The deepest level of processing, the one that requires meaningful recoding, is semantic
encoding, or paying attention to the words’ meanings. A specific task to encourage
semantic encoding might be to judge whether the word makes sense in the following
sentence: “The __ fell down the stairs.”

Craik’s research consistently showed that memory was better the deeper the
processing. Semantic processing was better than acoustic processing, which was
better than visual processing. This is a basic principle of memory that you can start
using today to improve your memory: to e ectively encode, you should recode
information in a way that allows you to process the meaning of what you are trying to
remember.

auditory (acoustic) encoding: encoding from working memory into long-term memory
by paying attention to the sounds of words only

levels of processing: strategies that a ect how well a memory is encoded. Craik and
Tulving’s research demonstrates that deeper processing (that is, semantic encoding)
leads to better memory than shallower processing (that is, encoding based on auditory
and visual properties)

recoding: transforming information to be encoded into a di erent format

rehearsal: the basic strategy that people use to encode information from working
memory into long term memory

semantic encoding: encoding from working memory into long-term memory by paying
attention to the meaning of words

How Can You Recode for Meaning?

One main reason that recoding for meaning helps to create solid memories is that it
takes advantage of the format of information when it is stored in long-term memory. Try
this: Tell a few minutes of the story “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” or any other story
you know from your childhood. Did you tell the story word-for-word the way it was told
to you? Probably not. But still you remembered the characters and the sequence of
events quite well. Typically (but not always), long-term memory stores information by
meaning, taking advantage of patterns and creating links between concepts and people
and events (Bransford, Barclay, & Franks; 1972; Brewer, 1977). This tendency allows you
to recall the general story, but not the precise story, whether it is a children’s fantasy, a
description in a textbook, or some event that happens to you. When you make special
e orts to encode meaning, you are playing to the natural tendencies and strengths of
your long-term memory.

Any way that you can make information meaningful should help make your e orts to
remember more successful. Here are some useful strategies that you can use for
reading textbooks and remembering lectures and other course material:

Elaborative Verbal rehearsal and Self-Reference

Try elaborative verbal rehearsal, which is basically restating what you have just read or
heard in your own words. After reading a short section or paragraph, pretend that a
friend has asked you to explain it. Or pretend that you are trying to teach the material to
someone. Although this can be di icult to do, the payo is tremendous. In one study
that compared high-performing and low-performing students who were taking General
Psychology, the use of elaborative verbal rehearsal was the most important di erence
(Ratli -Crain and Klopfleisch, 2005).

Use the self-reference e ect by trying to apply the material to yourself (Forsyth &
Wibberly, 1993; Fujita, & Horiuchi, 2004, Jackson et al. 2019). Suppose you were trying
to teach some course content to someone else. You might decide to use some real-life
examples to help your students understand the material. Well, it turns out that this
strategy is extremely powerful for remembering the material yourself. Continually ask
yourself, “Can I think of an example of this concept from my own life?” or even simply,
“How does this apply to me?” Creating a mental link between the course material and
what it means to you is one of the very best ways to encode meaning. With practice, you
should be able to use this strategy in many of your courses. The self-reference e ect is
very robust; it has been demonstrated with children, college students, older adults (with
and without mild cognitive impairment), and adults and adolescents with autism
(Jackson et al 2019; Lind et al. 2019).

Keep in mind as you consider trying these strategies that they can be hard to do, at least
at first. It is certainly harder, and more time consuming, to do elaborative verbal
rehearsal than to simply read a textbook chapter once. But it is no more time
consuming than re-reading a chapter a few times because you know you will not be able
to remember it. Also keep in mind that, as you get better at using the strategies, they
grow more e ective and get easier to use.

elaborative verbal rehearsal: an encoding technique that encourages semantic

processing by restating to-be-remembered information in your own words, as if
teaching it to someone else

self-reference e ect: an encoding technique that encourages semantic processing by

applying to-be-remembered information to yourself

Organize Information

Imagine that you are visiting a city for the first time. You have only a vague idea of where
you are and you need to get to the post o ice. What you need is a map. A map can help
you to learn where important things are and can help you figure out how to find them.

That is what the organizational aids in this book are, as well as the chapter outlines (and
tables of contents) in other books and even web sitemaps. They are maps. They are
useful for helping you e ectively transfer information from working memory into long-
term memory because they organize that information in a meaningful way.

If you can organize information meaningfully (or take advantage of a meaningful

organization provided for you), it will be more e ectively encoded into long-term
memory (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 1999; Halpern, 1986). The beauty of this strategy
from a practical standpoint in school is that often the work is done for you. Someone
has already gone to the trouble of coming up with a meaningful organizational scheme.
Use the chapter outlines to plot your route through your textbook. Pay attention during
the first five minutes of lecture when your professor gives you a preview of the day’s
lecture and activities.

Signaling Meaning in Advance

One of the reasons that outlines and previews help you put information into long-term
memory is that they alert you in advance to the types of information you’ll be
encountering. Sometimes just a little bit of information goes a long way. Even something
as simple as knowing the title of reading material before you start reading allows you to
organize the information so that it makes sense and can be remembered.

John Bransford and his colleagues demonstrated this kind of e ect by asking two
groups of research participants to remember a paragraph. For the first group, the
paragraph alone was presented. Here is one of their paragraphs. See how well you think
you would remember it:

The procedure is actually quite simple. First you arrange things into di erent groups. Of
course, one pile may be su icient depending on how much there is to do. If you have to
go somewhere else due to lack of facilities that is the next step, otherwise you are pretty
well set. It is important not to overdo things. That is, it is better to do too few things at
once than too many. In the short run, this may not seem important but complications
can easily arise. A mistake can be expensive as well. At first the whole procedure will
seem complicated. Soon, however, it will become just another facet of life. It is di icult
to foresee any end to the necessity of this task in the immediate future, but then one
never can tell. After the procedure is completed one arranges the materials into
di erent groups again. Then they can be put into their appropriate places. Eventually
they will be used once more and the whole cycle will then have to be repeated.
However, that is part of life (from Bransford and Johnson, 1972).

Do you think you would do a good job on a memory test for this paragraph? Bransford
and Johnson’s participants did very poorly. Although the individual sentences are
meaningful, it is di icult to see how they are related to each other—in other words, how
they are organized.

The second group of participants read the same paragraph, but before doing so, they
were given the title “Doing the Laundry.” Now that you know the title, go back and read
the paragraph again and see if it makes sense. If you are like most of Bransford and
Johnson’s participants, providing a title makes the paragraph much easier to
understand and remember.
What Bransford and Johnson demonstrated is that the title allows readers to make
inferences—that is, to use their background knowledge to tie the paragraph together.
For example, in the second sentence, the title allows you to draw the inference that the
word “things” refers to “clothes.” Inferences like these relate the formerly meaningless
paragraph to the knowledge about the world that you already have. By providing a title,
Bransford and Johnson allowed participants to activate their own knowledge about the
way the world is organized before they started reading the paragraph. The title gave
them preexisting memory hooks on which to hang the new words that they were
reading.

Highlighting Relationships

In order for the technique of organizing to encode to work, you have to find the
organization meaningful. That is, you have to see the organization as more than simply a
list of topics. You need to learn to recognize the typical relationships between concepts.
An outline or a table of contents, with items indented di erent amounts and di erent
formatting for various levels of headings, also shows the relationships among the
topics: which concepts can be grouped together, which are more important than others.
To a very large degree, organizing information to improve encoding is simply a matter of
paying attention to these types of relationships.

One very important relationship is between a general principle and an example of that
principle. Look for clues in the text of your book, such as introductory phrases (“for
example,” “the main idea is,” and the like). When you have identified whether a given
statement is a general principle or an example, try to generate the other. If you think it is
the general principle, try to come up with a new example. If you think it is an example,
make sure you can identify the general principle.

Here are three other types of relationships you should make a habit of distinguishing in
the materials you want to remember:

 Causes and e ects. For example, if we were doing an experiment on violent

video games and aggression, the independent variable, exposure to violent video
games, is the supposed cause, and the dependent variable, aggressiveness, is
the supposed e ect (see sec 2.3).

 Parts and wholes. For example, a neuron is essentially a small part of the brain
(the brain is made up of billions of neurons). Neurons themselves are composed
of parts, including the cell body, dendrites, and axons (see secs 5.3/11.1).

 Levels of a hierarchy. A hierarchy is an organization system in which lower-level,

or subordinate categories are included under higher-level, or superordinate
categories. For example, the levels of living things that you probably learned in
biology—kingdom, phylum, class, order, etc.—are organized in a hierarchy.
Any organization scheme that you come up with yourself will be particularly e ective.
Because you find it personally meaningful, a self-generated scheme will be easily and
e ectively encoded into long-term memory. You would be doing yourself a tremendous
favor if you adopted a good strategy for generating these organizational schemes.

Debrief

 In your own words, why is rephrasing textbook material in your own words an
e ective strategy for encoding information into long-term memory?

 Why can it be di icult to assemble something using a poorly written instruction

manual?

 Try to think of a situation in your life where you were unable to understand or
remember something because you did not know how it was organized.

 Why is it di icult to understand or remember a movie for which you missed the
first 30 minutes?

5.3 Memory Encoding and the Brain

Activate

What do you think of when you think of “dog”? Diagram your thoughts about “dog” by
following these directions:

 On a sheet of paper draw a small circle in the middle of the page and write the
word “dog” in the circle.

 Draw a short line out from this first circle and draw another circle at the end of
the line; inside the new circle write a word that relates to the word dog(perhaps
“tail”).

 Continue to draw lines out from the concept of dog and draw circles into which
you write words that are related to dog. Also, draw some lines out from some of
the new concepts and add concepts related to them. For example, if you wrote
down “tail” you might connect it to a circle with the word “wag.”

 When you are finished writing down new concepts, take a few minutes to draw
lines connecting some of the concepts that seem to be related.

The network of interrelated items that you have just created is a concept map. Yours
might look something like this:
 Figure 5.3: A concept map for “dog”

A concept map is, among other things, a good way to organize information for encoding
into long-term memory. It signals the meanings of a number of related concepts and
highlights the relationships among them (remember our discussion in section 5.3?). A
concept map is also a simple representation of how networks of concepts are formed in
the brain.

concept map: a pictorial representation of the relationships between a set of related

concepts

Creating Memories in the Brain: Activation and Synaptic Plasticity

You may already know that the brain is made up of billions of cells called neurons. For
now, you can think of the brain as simply a very large collection of neurons. The neurons
are all connected to each other in an extraordinarily complex pattern (one neuron can
be simultaneously connected to many other neurons, all of which can be connected to
many other neurons, and so on down the line). Neurons are connected to each other
by axons, which look like single long branches extending from the cell body, which is
the round part of the neuron, and by dendrites, which are smaller branches splitting o
from the cell body. (Each neuron has a single axon but many dendrites.) Electrical and
chemical activity that takes place through pathways created by these interconnected
neurons determines everything we say, think, feel, or do (see sec 11.1).
Figure 5.4: Neuron

The neurons are involved in two significant ways when you encode information:

 Activation. When you encode information and move it into memory, many
neurons throughout the brain become active. The neural activity is pulses of
electricity that are caused by chemicals called ions (electrically charged
particles) briefly changing locations in your brain. The ions (sodium, which is
abbreviated Na+) rush into the axon of a neuron. This movement of ions
produces a brief electrical charge inside the neuron, which is then transmitted to
many other neurons (see Module 11 for details).

 Synaptic plasticity. In order to store information for a long time, the brain has to
change its very structure—that is, the neurons themselves must change. Brain
researchers currently believe that the change in structure can occur either within
the individual neurons or through the connections among the billions of neurons
in your brain. The connections are called synapses, hence the name synaptic
plasticity. Changes that occur inside the neuron cause the neuron to produce
more or fewer of the chemicals that it uses to communicate with other neurons,
which are called neurotransmitters (see sec 11.3). The synapses are located at
the spaces where the axon of one neuron is situated next to the dendrites of a
neighboring neuron. Two things can happen in response to changing levels of
neurotransmitters: the axons and dendrites can extend or retract, hence
changing, ever so slightly, the structure of your brain; and the surface of the
 neuron can change by having more or fewer receptive areas for
neurotransmitters. Both of these events are forms of synaptic plasticity and
occur whenever new information is encountered.

These two kinds of changes, especially activation, happen extremely quickly. And the
changes of synaptic plasticity can last a very long time, perhaps even forever. Think
about it: any time you have a new experience your brain immediately changes its
electrical activity and changes its structure permanently.

activation: the electrical charging of a neuron, which readies it to communicate with

other neurons

axon: the single tube in a neuron that carries an electrical signal away, toward other
neurons

dendrite: one of the many branches on a neuron that receive incoming signals

neuron: the basic cell of the nervous system; our brain has billions of neurons

neurotransmitter: chemical that carries a neural signal from one neuron to another

synapse: the area between two adjacent neurons, where neural communication occurs

synaptic plasticity: the brain’s ability to change its structure through tiny changes in
the surfaces of neurons or in their ability to produce and release neurotransmitters

Storing Memories Across the Brain: Neural Networks

So far, we have just been thinking about connections between two neurons. Let us
return now to the idea that neurons are connected to each other in massive three-
dimensional, dynamic, organic versions of the concept map. We call these many
interconnected neurons neural networks. Many neuroscientists believe that most
memories are not stored in a specific area of the brain but are spread out in
interconnected neural networks across many areas of the brain. In other words, brain
activation and synaptic plasticity for memories travel throughout the brain.

This neural network idea o ers an explanation for why encoding meaning works so well
in forming long-lasting memories. When you start searching through your brain for
information—a memory—you will have a greater chance of hitting a unit of that
information with a neural network that is spread out and contains a lot of information. A
larger, more detailed network that uses lots of neurons will be easier to activate and use
than a smaller network.

neural network: interconnected group of neurons

Debrief
  Describe in your own words the changes that take place in your brain when you
encode new information into long-term memory.

 Draw a concept map that includes the concepts from this module.

5.4 Memory Retrieval

Activate

Have any of the following ever happened to you?

 You know a fact but can’t come up with it. You have the feeling that it is on the
“tip of your tongue.”

 You blank out on a test question. After a mighty struggle to remember, you give
up and leave the question unanswered (or you make a wild guess). Then, the
correct answer hits you on the way home like a slap in the head.

 You (temporarily) forget the name of someone who you know very well.

 You (temporarily) forget your own phone number.

 Is it true that you always find your keys in the last place you look for them?
(Answer: Yes, because most people stop looking after they find what they were
looking for.)

It is the day of the big Political Science mid-term. You have been studying for days. You
feel as if your head is so full of political facts, principles, and theories that it is going to
explode. Your professor walks in and asks if there are any questions before she hands
out the exam. “Please,” you silently beg, “hand out the exam now, before I forget
everything I studied.” After ten minutes of questions from classmates (that you don’t
listen to because you are too nervous), you get your exam. Question #1: How much of
the U.S. government’s budget is spent on foreign aid? You know this. You just studied it
last night. It is in your head somewhere if you could only find it. Why can’t you
remember? You are struggling with retrieval.

Understanding (and Improving) Retrieval

Memory retrieval (withdrawing information from long-term memory for use in working
memory) is largely a matter of coming up with and using e ective retrieval cues. In
familiar terms, retrieval cues are reminders, any information that automatically leads
you to remember something. More scientifically, you can think of retrieval cues as entry
points into the neural network associated with a particular memory (see sec 5.3).

You might also think of retrieval cues this (decidedly less scientific) way: Any specific
memory you have floating around in your head (the amount of U.S. foreign aid, for
example) is slippery. To pull it out of long-term memory and into working memory, you
need a hook, something attached to the specific memory that you can grab onto. A
retrieval cue is that hook. The very best hooks are ones that you put there yourself
during recoding.

To create potential retrieval cues for yourself while you’re studying, you can use the
encoding principles we have already described: encode meaning and organize
information. The more cues you create through this recoding and the better they are, the
better your chances of being able to “grab onto one” when you need it.

Now you might begin to understand why straight repetition is only a mediocre study
strategy. To be sure, the repetition of a concept and its definition provide you with a
possible retrieval cue. A formerly meaningless term and definition, completely
disconnected from the rest of the knowledge in your head, is not the world’s greatest
hook, however.

In contrast, consider a retrieval cue that is based on memories from your own life. For
example, suppose when trying to encode the concept procedural memory into your
long-term memory, you remembered the time you helped your little sister learn how to
tie her shoes. The formerly meaningless concept, procedural memory, now becomes
part of your memory for this event.

Importantly, you would probably have a fairly detailed memory of such an event. Any of
these details can serve you as a possible retrieval cue. Can you picture the smile on
your little sister’s face when she finally got her shoes tied right? That can be your hook.
Do you remember the feeling of frustration before she caught on? That can be your
hook. And so on. Literally anything you might remember about the event can work to
remind you of the concept procedural memory.

That is the beauty of making the information personally meaningful (remember, it is

called the self reference e ect). It becomes embedded in a rich network of information
that is the easiest stu in the world for you to remember—information about yourself.
The specific hook, or retrieval cue, can be any aspect of the event that you can recall.
Add this to the recoding that you did based on organization (for example, attending to
the relationship between procedural and declarative memory) and by rephrasing the
material in your own words, and you have an extremely powerful set of potential
retrieval cues, a set of hooks that give you an excellent chance of being able to grab one
when you need it.

memory retrieval: withdrawing information from long-term memory into working

memory

retrieval cue: a reminder that leads to the withdrawal of information from long-term
memory into working memory

Providing a Match Between Encoding and Retrieval

Sometimes, even extensive encoding is not enough to give you a good retrieval cue
when you need it. Or, perhaps, you didn’t do a careful job of encoding. What then? Is
there still a way to make retrieval cues work in your favor? Fortunately, the answer is
yes.

The general strategy that you use to make retrieval cues available and useful is to try to
provide some kind of match between the encoding and retrieval situations. This idea is
known as the encoding specificity principle (Tulving & Thomson, 1973). If your
physiological state or the external environment (the context) is similar during both
encoding and retrieval, you have a better chance of coming up with a retrieval cue
(Murnane & Phelps, 1993; Smith, 1979). For example, suppose you drank four cups of
co ee, each with an extra shot of espresso, when you were encoding information for a
big test. You might consider ingesting a bit of ca eine before retrieval time.

Even seemingly trivial aspects of the external environment, such as your location in a
room, can be just the match you need to give you a retrieval cue. But hold on before you
decide to wear the same clothes every day to take advantage of the encoding specificity
e ect. Think about what we are saying. The encoding specificity e ect allows you to
remember something in a situation that closely matches the situation at encoding. That
might be helpful for an exam, but is that what you really want to accomplish? For
example, suppose you are studying to be a nurse. Do you really want to remember some
important medical concept ONLY when you are sitting at your desk, wearing your
favorite blue shirt, and chewing peppermint flavored gum? We thought not. If you really
want to learn something, to be able to retrieve it in many future situations, you would do
best to simulate that when you encode it. In other words, engage in multiple encoding
episodes, and vary the context in each (Bjork & Bjork 2011). This is hard. In fact, it is one
of the list of strategies known as desirable di iculties. These are strategies that are
di icult to use and make you feel as if you are not learning, but in reality lead to much
more e ective (and lasting) learning (Bjork & Bjork 2011; Smith, Glenberg & Bjork, 1978).
You might also consider some of the strategies we have recommended previously (e.g.,
elaborative verbal rehearsal and generating self-references) to be other types of
desirable di iculties. As we said previously, they can be hard to use, but they are
extremely e ective.

Saving the Best for Last: Retrieval Practice (and Spacing)

So, do you think that the principles we have shared so far can help you in your quest to
improve your memory? Well, we have terrific news: We have saved some of the best
news for last. There is one strategy that may have been first suggested by Aristotle and
has been examined in research for over 100 years. Time and again, this strategy has
been found to lead to better memory than re-studying material (Brown, Roediger, &
McDermott, 2014). And very few students use this strategy (Karpicke, Butler, & Roediger,
2009). OK, have we kept you in enough suspense? Here it is: If you want to be able to
retrieve information from memory, one of the most important things you should do is to
PRACTICE retrieving that information (sorry for yelling, but this is that important. And
not just once. You should practice retrieval over time, spacing out your practice
sessions as much as you can. (Soderstrom, Kerr, and Bjork 2016; Karpicke and
Roediger, 2008). Many students believe that it is more e icient to do all of their studying
at one time, but the spacing e ect shows that the very opposite is true.

This is obviously great news because you do not need to recode information or come up
with new examples, or struggle with organization to use these strategies. You only need
to intentionally practice and organize your time.

Just as a reminder or clarification: we are certainly not saying that you should only
practice retrieval with the spacing e ect. We are saying that it is the one strategy that
may have the largest impact on your ability to remember. So, to summarize, allow us to
present a guide to studying that is based on some the best principles of memory that
psychologists have to o er.

1. Spend some time surveying the material before you start reading it. Figure out
how it is organized by reading previews and summaries, and paying attention to
outlines.

2. Recode for meaning while you read: periodically pause and reflect on what you
have just read. Rephrase material and come up with examples from your own life
(elaborative verbal rehearsal with self-reference). Note relationships between
di erent concepts. Pay attention to how the current information fits into what
you have already learned.

3. Practice retrieving while you are reading. During some of your periodic pauses,
cover up what you just read. Try to retrieve the definitions of key terms. Try to
generate your elaborative verbal rehearsals without looking at the text.

4. Practice retrieval after reading. Use practice quizzes, flash cards, quizlet, etc. It
is far more e ective if you have to come up with the answers yourself rather than
just recognizing the answer (like in a multiple-choice question).

5. Come up with a schedule that allows you to take advantage of the spacing e ect.

desirable di iculties: strategies that are di icult to use and make you feel as if you are
not learning, but lead to much more e ective and lasting learning

spacing e ect: the finding that information that is learned and practiced over a period
of time (instead of all at once) is remembered better

Debrief

 Try to remember a time that you had a temporary retrieval failure. What retrieval
cue eventually helped you to remember?
  What specific types of retrieval cues do you think work best for you?

5.5 Memory Construction and Distortion

Activate

 Do you have any memories in which you see yourself in the third person, as if you
were watching yourself on television? Doesn’t that seem odd, considering the
fact that you never experience yourself that way?

 Have you ever had an argument with someone about an event that happened in
which the main point of disagreement is that the two of you remember the event
di erently? Were you both sure that you were right?

College student Charles was always proud of his memory. In school, he rarely took
notes and often had to read a chapter a single time only in order to remember it well
enough to get a good grade on an exam. He also had many detailed autobiographical
memories, several dating back to when he was a very small child. For example, he
remembered his mother coming home from the hospital when his brother was born; he
was two years, four months old. Or he remembered an early haircut, perhaps his first
visit to the barber. He was sitting in the barber’s chair, eating a lollipop (covered with
hair, no doubt), while his whole family stood around and watched.

One evening during Charles’s sophomore year, he and his family decided to watch some
old videos from the family to celebrate his parents’ anniversary. Then, suddenly, Charles
saw his memory on the television screen. It was his first haircut. His parents had
obviously wanted to remember the event for the rest of their lives, so they decided to
capture it on film. There in the family room Charles saw his entire memory played out on
the screen, and he realized that he did not, in fact, have a memory of his first haircut. He
had a memory of the home movie of his first haircut and had mistakenly believed that it
was a memory of the actual event. Charles also knew this because he had just learned
this concept in his psychology class. Forgetting the actual source of a memory is very
common; it is called source misattribution (Schacter, 2001). It is one form of memory
distortion.

The early sections of this module emphasized how employing good encoding and
retrieval skills can lead you to remember information more e ectively. Somewhat
hidden in those discussions, however, is an important observation about the way
memory works. Although it is fair to accept the existence of di erent memory systems,
such as working memory and long-term memory, it is not fair to assume that
information gets copied into these systems perfectly, to be replayed accurately and in
its entirety every time the correct retrieval cue is accessed. Memory, it turns out, is
much more dynamic than that.
Instead of thinking of memory as something to be recorded and played back, it is more
accurate to say you construct memories of events as you go along. The idea of memory
construction might be hard to accept at first, but it is the simplest way to explain how
memories for events change over time. Not only do some of the details of memories
fade (as you might realize), but new details also creep into them. For example, imagine
that someone tells you a very unusual story that does not make a great deal of sense to
you. The story is from a non-Western culture and is quite di icult for you to follow
(assuming you are from a Western culture, of course). Over time, as you attempt to
recall this story, it will begin to resemble stories that are more familiar to you, with many
of the cultural idiosyncrasies forgotten and replaced by themes and details more typical
of Western culture (see Window 2).

A number of factors may render a memory incomplete or inaccurate. The kind and
amount of processing that takes place at encoding can have a huge impact on the
contents of an eventual memory. Also, minor distortions that are consistent with one’s
view of the world often creep in. Imagine that you are visiting your psychology
professor’s o ice for the first time. After leaving, you are asked to report what was in the
o ice. Most people have beliefs about what sorts of objects would be in a professor’s
o ice (such as desk, telephone, books), and they would be likely to think they
remembered seeing these objects even if they were not actually in the professor’s
o ice. Nearly one-third of the participants in a study similar to the situation just
described reported seeing books in a professor’s o ice—even though the o ice had
been specifically set up without books to test if participants would falsely remember
them (Brewer & Treyens 1981).

Elizabeth Loftus and her colleagues have pioneered research on the misinformation
e ect, perhaps the most dramatic demonstration of the way that memory can be
distorted. Loftus’s research has demonstrated that information given to people after an
event occurs, even at retrieval, can lead to memory distortions. For example, research
participants who had been shown a slide show of a car accident were later misled to
believe that a stop sign was pictured in one of the slides. Many of these participants on
a subsequent memory test mistakenly reported that they had seen the stop sign (Loftus,
Miller, and Burns, 1978).

In another experiment, research participants were asked one of two questions after
viewing a videotape of an accident between two cars. In one condition, they were
asked, “How fast were the cars going when they hit each other?” In the other condition,
participants were asked, “How fast were the cars going when they smashed into each
other?” One week later, participants who had been asked the “smashed” version of the
question were more likely to report seeing broken glass in the video (Loftus, Schooler,
and Wagenaar, 1985).
The misinformation e ect has been demonstrated many times, even leading
participants to remember events that did not occur at all, such as spilling a punch bowl
or being lost in a mall as a child (Hyman and Pentland, 1996; Loftus and Pickrell, 1995).

 memory construction: the process of building up a recollection of an event,

rather than “playing” a memory, as if it were a recording

 misinformation e ect: a memory distortion that results when misleading

information is presented to people after an event has occurred

 source misattribution: a memory distortion in which a person misremembers

the actual source of a memory

Debrief

 Can you think of a memory from your life that you would be willing to admit might
be a memory distortion?
Sensation & Perception - When we smell a fragrant flower, are we experiencing a
sensation or a perception? In everyday language, the terms "sensation" and
"perception' are often used interchangeably.

However, as you will soon see, they are very distinct, yet complementary processes. In
this section, we will discuss some concepts central to the study of sensation and
perception and then move on to discuss vision and the perception of pain (it is not
possible in the scope of these notes to discuss all the senses).

I. Sensations and Perceptions

Sensations can be defined as the passive process of bringing information from the
outside world into the body and to the brain. The process is passive in the sense that
we do not have to be consciously engaging in a "sensing" process.Perception can be
defined as the active process of selecting, organizing, and interpreting the
information brought to the brain by the senses.

A) HOW THEY WORK TOGETHER:

1) Sensation occurs:

a) sensory organs absorb energy from a physical stimulus in the environment.

b) sensory receptors convert this energy into neural impulses and send them to the
brain.

2) Perception follows:

a) the brain organizes the information and translates it into something meaningful.

B) But what does "meaningful" mean? How do we know what information is important
and should be focused on?

1) Selective Attention - process of discriminating between what is important & is

irrelevant (Seems redundant: selective-attention?), and is influenced by motivation.

For example - students in class should focus on what the teachers are saying and the
overheads being presented. Students walking by the classroom may focus on people in
the room, who is the teacher, etc., and not the same thing the students in the class.

2) Perceptual Expectancy - how we perceive the world is a function of our past

experiences, culture, and biological makeup.For example, as an American, when I look
at a highway, I expect to see cars, trucks, etc, NOT airplanes. But someone from a
di erent country with di erent experiences and history may not have any idea what to
expect and thus be surprised when they see cars go driving by.
Another example - you may look at a painting and not really understand the message
the artist is trying to convey. But, if someone tells you about it, you might begin to see
things in the painting that you were unable to see before.

ALL OF THIS IS CALLED Psychophysics

C) Psychophysics can be defined as, the study of how physical stimuli are translated
into psychological experience.

In order to measure these events, psychologists use THRESHOLDS.

1) Threshold - a dividing line between what has detectable energy and what does not.

For example - many classrooms have automatic light sensors. When people have not
been in a room for a while, the lights go out. However, once someone walks into the
room, the lights go back on. For this to happen, the sensor has a threshold for motion
that must be crossed before it turns the lights back on. So, dust floating in the room
should not make the lights go on, but a person walking in should.

2) Di erence Threshold - the minimum amount of stimulus intensity change needed to

produce a noticeable change.

the greater the intensity (ex., weight) of a stimulus, the greater the change needed to
produce a noticeable change.

For example, when you pick up a 5 lb weight, and then a 10 pound weight, you can feel a
big di erence between the two. However, when you pick up 100 lbs, and then 105 lbs, it
is much more di icult to feel the di erence.

3) Signal-Detection Theory - detection of a stimulus involves some decision making

process as well as a sensory process. Additionally, both sensory and decision making
processes are influenced by many more factors than just intensity.

a) Noise - how much outside interference exists.

b) Criterion - the level of assurance that you decide must be met before you take action.
Involves higher mental processes. You set criterion based on expectations and
consequences of inaccuracy.

For example - at a party, you order a pizza...you need to pay attention so that you will be
able to detect the appropriate signal (doorbell), especially since there is a lot of noise at
the party. But when you first order the pizza, you know it won't be there in 2 minutes, so
you don't really pay attention for the doorbell. As the time for the pizza to arrive
approaches, however, your criterion changes...you become more focused on the
doorbell and less on extraneous noise.

II. SIGHT/VISION
A) the visual system works on sensing and perceiving light waves. Light waves vary in
their length and amplitude:

a) wave length (also referred to as frequency, since the longer a wave, the less
often/quickly it occurs) - a ects color perception (ex., red=approx 700, yellow approx
600)

b) wave amplitude (this is the size/height of the wave) - a ects brightness perception.

B) Structure of The EYE:

1) Cornea - the round, transparent area that allows light to pass into the eye.

2) Lens - the transparent structure that focuses light onto the retina.

3) Retina - inner membrane of the eye that receives information about light using rods
and cones. The functioning of the retina is similar to the spinal cord - both act as a
highway for information to travel on.

4) Pupil - opening at the center of the iris which controls the amount of light entering the
eye. Dilates and Constricts.

5) Rods & Cones - many more rods (approximately 120 million) than cones (approx 6.4
million).

a) cones - visual receptor cells that are important in daylight vision and color vision.

the cones work well in daylight, but not in dim lighting. This is why it is more di icult to
see colors in low light.

most are located in the center of the retina...called the FOVEA, which is a tiny spot in
the center of the retina that contains ONLY cones...visual acuity is best here.

SO...when you need to focus on something you attempt to bring the image into the
fovea.

b) rods - visual receptor cells that are important for night vision and peripheral vision.

the rods are better for night vision because they are much more sensitive than cones.

in addition, the rods are better for peripheral vision because there are many more on the
periphery of the retina. The cones are mostly in and around the fovea but decrease as
you go out.

to see best at night, look just above or below the object...this keeps the image on the
rods.

C) Seeing In Color - we can see many colors, but only have 3 types of cones that receive
information about color. We have cones that pick up light waves for red, green, and
blue.
Color Vision Theories:

1) Trichromatic Theory - this theory indicates that we can receive 3 types of colors (red,
green, and blue) and that the cones vary the ratio of neural activity (Like a projection
T.V.). The ratio of each each color to the other then determines the exact color that we
see.

2) Opponent-Process Theory - color perception depends on the reception of pairs of

antagonist colors. Each receptor can only work with one color at a time so the opponent
color in the pair is blocked out. Pairs = red-green, blue-yellow, black- white (light-dark).

Note: Most every Introductory Psychology book has a demonstration on the Opponent-
Process theory. Please look for the one in your book and give it a try.

DOES COLOR EXIST? People just assume that because we see colors, that they actually
exist in the world. In other words, that when they see the color red, that red is a real,
physical, tangible, "thing". But is it, or is color just a matter of our perception? If we had
di erent types of nervous systems, we would see things di erently (literally) and so
wouldn't we think those other things we saw were the real "things"? Let's examine this
question of perception a bit further.

II) PERCEPTION

Much of our understanding of how and why we perceive things comes from Gestalt
Psychology

For example - one of the most well known Gestalt principles is the Phi Phenomenon,
which is the illusion of movement from presenting stimuli in rapid succession. When
you see a cartoon or running Christmas lights, you see movement (although none
actually exists) because of this principle.

A) Gestalt Principles of Perceptual Organization

1) figure-ground - this is the fundamental way we organize visual perceptions. When we

look at an object, we see that object (figure) and the background (ground) on which it
sits. For example, when I see a picture of a friend, I see my friends face (figure) and the
beautiful Sears brand backdrop behind my friend (ground).

2) simplicity/pragnanz (good form) - we group elements that make a good form.

However, the idea of "good form" is a little vague and subjective. Most psychologists
think good form is what ever is easiest or most simple. For example, what do you see
here: : > )

do you see a smiling face? There are simply 3 elements from my keyboard next to each
other, but it is "easy" to organize the elements into a shape that we are familiar with.
3) proximity - nearness=belongingness. Objects that are close to each other in physical
space are often perceived as belonging together.

4) similarity - do I really need to explain this one? As you probably guessed, this one
states that objects that are similar are perceived as going together. For example, if I ask
you to group the following objects: (* * # * # # #) into groups, you would probably place
the asterisks and the pound signs into distinct groups.

5) continuity - we follow whatever direction we are led. Dots in a smooth curve appear to
go together more than jagged angles. This principle really gets at just how lazy humans
are when it comes to perception.

6) common fate - elements that move together tend to be grouped together. For
example, when you see geese flying south for the winter, they often appear to be in a "V"
shape.

7) closure - we tend to complete a form when it has gaps.

B) Illusions - an incorrect perception caused by a distortion of visual sensations.

1) Muller-Luyer Illusion

2) Reversible Figures - ambiguous sensory information that creates more than 1 good
form. For example, the picture of two faces looking toward each other that is also a
vase. I am sure most every Introductory Psychology book has this example.

3) Impossible Figures - objects that can be represented in 2-dimensional pictures but

can not exist in 3-dimensional space despite our perceptions. You know the artist,
Escher who draws the pictures like...the hands drawing each other, the waterfall that
goes down and stays level at the same time, etc...

C) THE PERCEPTION OF PAIN

Pain is an unpleasant yet important function for survival: warning system (but not all
pain is needed for survival).

There are two di erent pathways to the brain on which pain can travel - information
brought from free nerve endings in the skin to the brain via two di erent systems:

1) fast pathways - registers localized pain (usually sharp pain) and sends the
information to the cortex in a fraction of a second. EX. - cut your finger with a knife.

2) slow pathways - sends information through the limbic system which takes about 1-2
seconds longer than directly to the cortex (longer lasting, aching/burning).

Factors in Pain Perception - not an automatic result of stimulation:

1) expectations - research shown that our expectations about how much something will
hurt can e ect our perception.
Melzack - indicated that believing that something will be very painful helps us prepare
for it.

For example - child birth: Lamaze method falsely leads us to believe it won't be painful.
Maybe if we know it will be bad we can adequately prepare to handle it.

another example - placebo e ect - if we believe pain has stopped, it may.

2) personality - people with negative types of personalities often have more pain. E

For example - a very uptight person may experience muscle pains, back pains, etc.

3) mood - bad moods, angry, unhappy, etc, can lead to the experience of increased pain.

For example - study manipulated moods of subjects then asked them to complete
questionnaires of pain perception. Those in negative mood group reported significantly
more pain than other subjects.

So, it seems that our brains can regulate, control, determine, and even produce pain.

THEORIES OF PAIN PERCEPTION

1) Gate Control Theory (Melzack & Walls, 1965) - incoming pain must pass through a
"gate" located in the spinal cord which determines what information about pain will be
sent to the brain. So, it can be opened to allow pain through or closed to prevent pain
from being perceived.

The Gate - actually a neural network controlled by the brain. Located in an area of the
spinal cord called the Substansia Gelatinosa. There are two types of nerve fibers in this
area:

a) large - sends fast signals and can prevent pain by closing the gate.

b) small - sends slower signals which open the gate. So - when pain occurs it is because
the large fibers are o and the small are on, opening the gate.

Since the gate is controlled by the brain, he factors discussed earlier (expectations,
mood, personality) influence the functioning of the gate.

Contradiction to Gate Control Theory:

1) endorphins - the body's own pain killers (morphine-like). May explain acupuncture,
acupressure, pain tolerance during last two weeks of pregnancy, etc.

BUT- endorphins may work with the gate control theory - maybe pain is perceived,
endorphins are released, so the brain no longer needs the signals and closes the gate.

PHANTOM LIMBS
ability to feel pain, pressure, temperature, and many other types of sensations including
pain in a limb that does not exist (either amputated or born without).

the feelings and the pain are sometimes so life-like that person attempts to pick things
up with phantom hand, step with phantom foot or leg, etc. Often person feels phantom
moving in perfect coordination with the rest of the body - some report a missing arm
extending outward at a 90 degree angle so they turn sideways when going through a
doorway.

may occur right after amputation or not until years later.

often felt as part of the body (belonging to the rest of the body). EX. - with a missing leg,
some report having a phantom foot but not the rest of the leg. Still, the foot feels as
though it is part of the body.

Go to Phantom Limb Pages - includes case studies

Explanations:

1) the neuroma explanation - remaining nerves in the stump grow into nodules
(neuromas) at the end of the stump continue to fire signals. Signals follow the same
pathways the brain as when the appendage existed.

2) the spinal cord explanation - neurons in the spinal cord that are no longer receiving
information from the lost appendage continue to send information to the brain.

Problem - studies have shown that when areas in the spinal cord are severed often
feelings still being perceived from areas that meet the spinal cord in lower areas (below
separation in spinal cord).

3) the brain explanation - signals in the somatosensory circuits of the brain change
when the limb is lost which produce the phantom...the brain compensates for the loss
or altered signals. This has been expanded - brain contains a network of fibers that not
only respond to stimulation but continually generates a pattern of impulses that
indicate that the body is intact and functioning. Thus, the brain creates the impression
that the limb exists and is al right. This system may be prewired.

4) the hardwired explanation - we may have a biological makeup to be born with all of
our appendages. So, when we are born w/o one or lose one, the nerves are still there
and are still going to send the information.

Please note that we can not cover ALL the senses in class so make sure you read about
taste, touch, hearing, and smell in the book.
Muller-Lyer explained

Although many theories exist for this illusion, there is no certain explanation. One
theory is based on eye movement. When the arrows point inwards, our gaze rests inside
the angles formed by the arrows. When they point outwards, our eyes demarcate the
entire perspective and our gaze rests outside the angles. The outward pointing arrows
make the figure more open and so the horizontal line appears longer.

The illusion takes its name from Franz Carl Müller-Lyer (1857-1916), who studied
medicine in Strasbourg and served as assistant director of the city's psychiatric clinic.
Müller-Lyer's main works were in the field of sociology. He himself attempted to explain
the illusion he had discovered as follows: "the judgment not only takes the lines
themselves into consideration, but also, unintentionally, some part of the space on
either side." He published two articles on the illusion bearing his name. ('Optical
Illusions' 1889, and 'Concerning the Theory of Optical Illusions: on Contrast and
Confluxion' 1896)

Favreau (1977) studied a number of textbooks in which Müller-Lyer presented and

measured the figures. He noticed that in many cases, the figure had been drawn the
wrong way round so that the illusion appeared more forceful!
 CHA PTER 2: SELF AND PERSONALITY

INTRODUCTION:
Self and personality are the two important aspects in the field of psychology, they are the characteristic ways in which we
define ourselves. They refer to the ways in which our experiences are organized and reflect in our behaviour. Every
individual has a different personality, even though they might be in similar situations. But a person’s own responses to
different situations generally revolve around similar theme. This theme is called personality. Personality comes from a
Latin word ‘Persona’ (mask). Personality includes external as well as internal factors.
Self includes everything related to one self. I, me, self and relationship with others, i.e., things and values that we relate to
ourselves. The subjective reality is personal to the individual and no one can feel the exact thing.

CONCEPT OF SELF:
 Self refers to the totality of an individual’s conscious experience, ideas, thoughts and feelings with regard to
themselves.
 Self is the awareness about ‘I’. The idea that self is the center of individual existence. We understand
environment, society, friends, and parents in relation to self.
 The idea of self emerges as we get older, a newborn has no idea about its self. Our interaction with the
environment and people, build our experiences and serves as basis for self. Everyone has their own idea of self
and it also keeps on growing and modifying as we grow.
o Personal identity refers to those attributes of a person that makes them different from other people. This
includes their name, qualities or characteristics, potentials and beliefs.
o Social Identity refers to those aspects of a person that connects them to a group (social or cultural). This
includes religion, country, state, etc. This description characterizes the way people mentally represent
themselves as a person.
 Personal identity and social identity together makes ‘self’.

I. Self as Subject and Object :

 Self as Subject: As subject the self actively engages in the process of knowing itself.
Example: I am a dancer

 Self as Object: As an object the self gets observed and comes to be known.
Example: I am the one who easily gets hurt.

II. Kinds of self:

Various kinds of self are formed with our physical and socio-cultural interactions. Two main types of self are:
1) Personal Self: Personal self is primarily concerned with one’s own self. It emerges with respect to our own
biological, psychological and social needs, i.e., personal responsibility, personal achievement or personal
comfort.
2) Social Self: Social self is concerned aspects of life that involves others, i.e., cooperation, unity, affiliation,
sacrifices, support or sharing. This self values family and social relationships.

I. Cognitive and behavioral aspects of self:

 Self-concept: The way one thinks about, evaluates or themselves and the ideas they hold about their attributes and
competencies is self-concept, i.e., to be aware of oneself. It can be positive, negative or even neutral. Development
of self-concept is very necessary for the development of behaviour, it is a part of reacting in a particular way or
displaying a specific kind of behaviour. Self-concept helps I differentiating ones existence from the rest.
 Self-esteem: The value we place upon ourselves or evaluate ourselves is called self-esteem. These evaluations
incorporate our personal comparisons to others as well as perceiving others responses to them our self-esteem
may be high in certain areas whereas low in others. Children seem to form self-esteem in four general areas;
academic, social, athletic and appearance. Self-esteem impacts our everyday behaviour; our actions, reactions,
perceptions and judgements.
 Self-efficacy: the extent to which a person believes that whether the outcomes of everything in their life depends on
themselves or luck is called self-efficacy. A person with high self-efficacy has confidence that their hard work can
bring them any results, i.e., outcomes of their life are fully in their own control. The concept of self-efficacy is
 based on Bandura’s Social Learning Theory, according to which, children and adults learned behaviours by
observing and copying others.
 Self-regulation: It refers to the ability to organize and monitor one’s own behaviour. People, who are able to
change their behaviour according to the demands of the external environment, are high on self-regulation.
Learning to delay gratification of needs is known as self-control. Techniques of self-control:
o Observation of Own behaviour: Collecting information about our behaviour that may use ti change,
monitor or strengthen certain aspects of self.
o Self-Instruction: We instruct ourselves to do something and we behave in the way we want.
o Self-reinforcement: rewarding behaviours that have pleasant outcomes.

II. Culture and self

Culture is linked with several aspects of self. Analysis of self in the Indian cultural context reveals its distinction from the
western culture. The most important distinction is boundary between self and others.
In the western view, this boundary is fixed. The Indian view of self is characterized by shifting nature of this boundary.

INDIVIDUAL GROUP

Western perspective

INDIVIDUAL GROUP

Indian perspective

The western view sees self and others as spate, as two different entities with clearly defined boundaries. Individual
members of the group maintain their individuality. This is often characterized as individualistic culture.
In Indian culture, the self exists as a part of the group, both remain in a state of harmonious co-existence. This is
characterized as collectivist culture.

CONCEPT OF PERSONALITY

Personality comes from a Latin word ‘persona’, which means mask. Personality refers to the internal and external factors
of an individual that makes them unique. Personality refers to our characteristic ways, our unique and relatively stable
qualities of responding to individuals and situations that determine an individual’s behaviour across different situation over
a period of time. Consistency in behaviour, thought and emotions of an individual across situations over a period of time,
determine their personality.
 According Gordon Allport, ‘personality is a dynamic organization, within the individual, of those psychophysical systems
that determine their unique adjustments to their environment.’
Therefore, personality is characterized by the following features:
1. In includes both physical and psychological components
2. Its expression in terms of behaviour is unique.
3. The main features of personality do not easily change with time.
4. Some of its feature may change due to external or internal situations.

MAJOR APPROACHES TO PERSONALITY

Approaches

Post-
Type Trait Psychodynamic Behavioural Cultural Humanistic
Freudian

I. Type Approach
The type approach attempts to understand human personality by examining certain broad patterns in the observed
behavioral characteristics of individuals. Each pattern refers to one type in which individuals are placed in terms of
similarities of their characteristics with that pattern.
 Hippocrates: He proposed a typology theory based on bodily fluid: humor. Personality is defined by the amount
of each of the following:
o Sanguine : Blood (Optimistic) – Heart
o Phlegmatic: Phlegm (slow and lethargic) – Lungs
o Melancholic: Black Bile (sad, depressed) – Gall Bladder
o Choleric: Yellow Bile (angry) – Spleen
 Charak Shamita: Ayurveda in India classifies people on the basis on the basis of three humoral elements known as
Tridosh which are – Vatta, Pitta and Kaph. The tridosh in different combinations give 16 types of personalities
under three broad categories known as ‘Triguna’.
o Satvik or Satva Guna: It includes attributes like cleanliness, truthfulness, dutifulness, detachment,
discipline, wise, mindful, etc.
o Rajsik or Rajas Guna: It includes intensive activity, desire for sense of gratification, courageous, envy for
others, materialistic, intolerant, brave, impulsive, strong will power, etc.
o Tamsic or Tamas Guna: It includes anger, arrogance, laziness, feeling of helplessness, instability, no
intellect, etc.
 As per Sheldon: William Herbert Sheldon, and American psychologist categorized personality types based on
body build and temperament.
o Endomorph: They are heavy, round and soft. Their body fat is distributed all over the body. They are fun
to be around, happy, jolly and even tempered. They want to be comfortable all the time.
o Mesomorphs: They are muscular and have strong build body. They are self-conscious, private, socially
anxious, assertive, competitive, energetic and courageous.
o Ectomorphs: They are thin, long and have fragile body built. They are introvert, intense, artistic, brainy
and thoughtful.
 As per Jung: **{FSTI}
 Carl Jung’s personality theory is the concepts of extroversion and introversion. He was the first to distinguish these
two major attitudes or orientations of personality of people: Introverts and Extroverts.
o Extroverts: This type is most associated with an outgoing and talkative personality. These people are
drawn to occupation that involves dealing with people directly. These often deal with anxious situations by
hiding in the crowd.
o Introverts: This type if often associated with quiet, reflective, shy and preference for aloofness. These
people withdraw themselves in stressful or conflicting situation.
 As per Friedman and Rosenman:
The personality types proposed by cardiologist Friedman and Rosenman classified people based on the way in
which they cope with stress.
o Type A: People in this category are highly motivated, driven to achieve high, lack of patience. They often
overwork and overburden themselves. People with this personality are more susceptible to hypertension
and coronary heart disease, the stress their endure and their inability to manage it, makes their systems go
through undue amount of unmanaged and unhealed stress. At times risk of developing CHD for type A
people is higher than that of patient with high Blood pressure, cholesterol or smoking.
o Type B: People in this category tend to be more relaxed than type A personalities and are able to cope
with stress better. They are able to express their emotions better and control their anger more effectively,
they are less prone to potentially harmful repression of emotions. In other words, it can also be
understood as the absence of Type A traits.
o Type C: This personality type was later added to the list as suggestion made by Greer and Morris. This
personality type is indicated as being prone to Cancer. People in this category do not express emotions
like type A, but instead repress it and direct it inwards. They may appear calm and passive, but their
repressed anger and internalized stress causes hormonal imbalances which gives them a high risk of
cancer.
o Type D: This personality type was added by Denollet (2005). People with this personality type are more
likely to report tension, worry and dysphoria. It refers to a general propensity to psychological distress.
These people are more prone to depression than other personality types and tend to experience strong
negative emotions and reactions.
II. Trait Approach
Trait approach focuses on the specific psychological attributes along which individuals tend to differ in consistent and
subtle ways. Trait refers to the ways in which we generally describe a person. Traits can be defined as a stable characteristic
that causes a person to react or respond to any situation. This approach indicates that traits are always constant regardless
of the situation.
In simple words, ‘building blocks’ of personality. This approach attempts to identify primary characteristics of people.
Main features of trait are:
1) Traits are relatively stable over time
2) They are consistent across situations
3) Their strengths and combinations vary across individuals leading to individual differences in personality.

 Allport’s Trait Theory

Gordon Allport proposed that, ‘Individuals possess a number of traits, which are dynamic in nature’. This theory
proposed that individuals approach to different situations with similar plans. Allport argued that the words people used
to describe themselves and others provide a basis for understanding human personality.

The way a person reacts to a given situation depends on his traits, though people sharing the same trait might express
them in different ways. Allport analyzed words of English and arranged them into three categories that depends on
range of the trait.

Trigger  Trait Response

Allport categorized traits into the following three categories:

1. Cardinal traits: These traits are pervasive and they dominate and shape a person’s behaviour. These are highly
generalized in nature and indicate the goal around which a person’s entire life seems to revolve. Every behaviour is
effected by this trait, it overshadows other traits. These traits are associated with some person to explain them
better or to understand the trait, for example – Hitler’s Nazism is termed as ‘Hitlerian’ or Mahatma Gandhi’s
Non-Violence is termed as ‘Gandhian’. These traits are generally one per individual.
2. Central traits: These are the traits generally used to explain the overall personality of an individual. These traits are
broad in effect and are generally 10 to 12 in a person. They explain the behaviour and may reflect in many
situations, however, not in all. For example: Intelligent, anxious, shy, etc.
 3. Secondary traits: These are the least generalized characteristics of a person. These are specific, unique and limited.
They come out only in a certain situation and have specific range. For example: ‘likes mangoes’ or prefer ethnic
clothes.

 Cattel’s Trait Theory

Raymond Bernard Cattell defined trait as relatively permanent reaction tendencies that are the basis structural unit of
personality. He believed that there is a common structure on which people differ from each other. Cattel defined
personality as, ‘Personality is that which permits a prediction of what a person will do in a given situation’.
He applied a statistical technique, called factor analysis to discover the common structures. He found Primary traits or
source traits and surface traits.
1. Source traits: Cattel gave 16 source traits. The basic structure of the personality of a person is made up of source
traits. They are stable, and are considered the building blocks of personality. All of us have the source traits in us,
but not of the same extent. Source traits are cause of behaviour over an extended period of time.
For example: Intelligence. He even developed a test called Sixteen Personality Factors Questionnaire (16 PF).
2. Surface traits: There are also a number of surface traits that result out of the interaction of source traits. These are
less stable with no single source. They are seen in the outwards actions of a person, i.e., present on the surface.

 Eysenck’s Theory
Hans Eysenck was a German psychologist who proposed a link between inheritance and personality. Eysenck was
convinced that not more than three traits are needed to account for most of human behaviour. Each dimension classifies a
number of specific traits:
1. Neuroticism vs Emotional stability: It refers to the degree to which people have control over their feelings and
reactions. Whenever our sympathetic nervous system is activated, it prepares us for ‘fight or flight’ situation, for
neuroticism the threshold for activation is low. People high on neuroticism tend to react more quickly to pain and
disturbing situations than stable people. People High on neuroticism are most likely to be anxious, tensed,
moody, have lack of autonomy and have low self-esteem. People with high emotional stability are calm, even
tempered, reliable and remain in control of their emotions.
2. Extraversion vs introversion: It refers to the degree to which people are socially outgoing and socially withdrawn.
Eysenck believed that introverts are over aroused, are sensitive and thus avoid situations that may overpower them.
Extroverts are under aroused and highly insensitive and thus seek for situations that excites them. Extroverts are
sociable, dominant risk taking, friendly, sensation seeking, expressive and active, however, they are also
irresponsible, lack reflection and are impulsive. Introverts are passive, quiet, cautious and reserved.
3. Psychoticism vs sociability: This is the last dimension he added later on to his theory. It is considered to interact
with the other two dimensions. It depends on the level of testosterone hormones. People high on testosterone are
high on psychoticism. People high on psychoticism are aggressive, assertive, egocentric, manipulative, lack
sympathy or empathy, achievement oriented and tough minded. They have disregard for common sense. People
high on sociability are friendly, active and reliable.

III. Psychodynamic Approach

Sigmund Freud is credited as the founder of psychodynamic approach. Freud used free association, dream analysis and
analysis of the errors to understand the functioning of human mind. Freud gave various theories in an attempt to
understand human mind.
 Level of Consciousness: Freud visualized human mind as three levels of consciousness-

Conscious

Pre Conscious

Unconscious
 i) Conscious: This represents awareness at the present moment. This includes thoughts, feelings, actions and
reactions to that people are aware about. It is having the awareness of outside as well as of mental
functions happening inside.
ii) Pre Conscious: It consists of accessible information. This information comes to awareness once the
attention is diverted on focused towards it. It is possible that some of what might be perceived as
unconscious becomes subconscious and that conscious. For example: long forgotten childhood memory
emerges after decades.
iii) Unconscious: Consists of primitive, instinctual desires, as well as the information, that we cannot access.
Although our behavior might indicate those unconscious forces, we do not have access to the information.
According to Freud, most of this information are derived from sexual desires which cannot be expressed
openly and therefore are repressed.
 Psychoanalysis: Freud developed a therapeutic procedure called psychoanalysis. It the view of human nature
which emphasizes on early childhood. He said that the initial years of a person’s life decide ot determines the
kind of person they become. He focused on the past. The basis goal of psychoanalysis is to bring the repressed
unconscious materials to the consciousness. It is based on the idea that our thoughts, emotions and behaviors are
influenced by unconscious process and that by exploring these processes we can gain insight into our behavior
patterns. The goal of this therapy is to help a person achieve greater self-awareness and to resolve internal
conflicts that may be causing emotional distress.
 Structure of personality: According to Freud, there are three basic elements of personality:
1. Id: It is the primitive instinct that works on two forces: life instinct or Eros that represents means to bring
about life, procreate, continuation of Bloodline and survival; and death instinct or Thanatos that
represents destructive forces, aggression, recklessness, procreation while elimination. Id follows pleasure
principle, that are unconscious impulses that need to be gratified, it assumes that people seek pleasure
and try to avoid pain. Libido is the instinctual life force that energizes the id. Id deals with immediate
gratification of sexual desires and aggressive impulses.
2. Ego: Ego develops out of id. Its primary function is to satisfy the id in accordance with the reality and
minimizing guilt. It develops during the primary three years of a child’s life when the child interacts with
the world. It works on reality principle and directs the id towards more appropriate ways of satisfying
needs. Ego is patient, reasonable and works by reality principle.
3. Superego: This is the moral center of our personality. It tells the id and the ego whether the gratification
in a particular instance is ethical or not. It develops by the end of phallic stage. It helps control id by
internalizing the parental authority through the process of socialization.
 Ego Defense Mechanism: Freud suggested that human are in a constant attempt to escape or deal with anxiety.
The primary goal of ego is to satisfy id while keeping it guilt or anxiety free. Therefore, people avoid anxiety by
developing ego defense mechanism. Defense Mechanism is a way of reducing anxiety by distorting reality. Freud
describe various defense mechanisms including:
1. Repression: This is basically motivated forgetting. In this, anxiety provoking behavior or thoughts is
completely dismissed by the unconscious. It is an unconscious defense mechanism where a person is
unable to recall a threatening situation, person or event.
2. Projection: In this, people attribute their own feelings on to others. That is, if a person is angry, he may
see the person as an aggressive person.
3. Denial: In this, a person totally refuses to accept reality. When it becomes too much to handle, the
person responds by refusing to perceive it by denying it exists.
4. Reaction formation: When the person reaches a stage beyond denial, it is called reaction formation. In
this the person defends against anxiety by acting exact opposite of how they actually feel. Usually, the
opposite reaction is exaggerated.
5. Rationalization: In this, a person tries to justify an act or behavior or event by stating unreasonable
statements in an attempt to accept it.
 Stages of Personality Development: Freud proposed a five stage developmental theory of personality also known
as psychosexual stages. These stages are:
1. Oral Stage: This stage occurs from birth to 18th months of age. The infant achieves oral gratification
through acts of feeding, biting, sucking and babbling. According to Freud, the first basic feelings about the
world is established at this stage, therefore bitter feeling of the world is due to difficulties during this stage.
Fixation at this stage, may lead to development of defense mechanism such as denial or projection.
 2. Anal stage: This stage represents the ages from 18 months to 3 years. This is the stage when the child
learns to control the bodily functions or urination and defecation. The Anal region is the focus of
pleasure seeking feelings at his stage by moving their bowels. Fixation at this stage has two personality
types, excessive obsession with cleanliness or messy and disorganized.
3. Phallic stage: This stage starts at 3 years of age through to 5 years of age. The stage focuses on genitals.
Children begin to realize the difference between males and females. At this stage, male child experiences
Oedipus complex, it involves desire for mother and hostility towards father. It also involves fearing the
father for punishment. For girls, this complex is called Electra complex. This involves desires for father.
The girl, symbolic marries the father and have a family. However when the child realizes the unlikely
scenario in either cases, they start to identify with the same sex parent, and copy their behavior to obtain
affection of the parent of opposite sex. The resolution of Oedipus and Electra complex involves
identification with the same sex parent.
4. Latency stage: This last from six years till puberty. During this stage, sexual feelings are repressed. The
child starts to learn about society, world, environment, etc. The child continues to grow physically. The
child starts to have same sex peers.
5. Genital stage: This stage starts from puberty to adulthood. According to Freud, the child has reached the
maturity of psychosexual stages. The repressed feelings, fears and sexuality of latency stage, are once
again active at this stage. The person is now interested in opposite sex relationships; whether socially or
sexually.
 According to Freud, from one stage to another, the child continuously adjusts his view of the world. If the child
fails to resolve the conflicts of any stage, it results in fixation at that stage. This fixation is carried to the adulthood.
 Regression happens when the child is unsuccessful in passing a stage, and therefore returns to the maturity level of
the early stages.

IV. Post- Freudian Approaches

Freud’s approach served as base for several theories that developed from them. These theories, however, have less focus
on sexual desires and aggression and more on expansion of the concept of ego. These theories emphasis qualities such as
creativity, competence and problem solving. These theories are:
1. Carl Jung: Aims and Aspirations: Carl Jung stated that human beings are equally guided by aims and
aspirations as by sex and aggression. He gave his theory of personality called Analytical psychology. Jung
claimed that there exists a deep and least accessible part of our psyche called Collective Unconscious that
contains memories and patterns of behaviors inherited from man’s ancestral past. This collective unconscious
consists of various archetypes, four of them are:
i. Personna: Protective mask that we wear.
ii. Shadow: negative or inferior side of personality (animal tendencies)
iii. Anima: personification of all feminine tendencies present in a man.
iv. Animus: personification of all masculine tendencies present in a woman.
2. Karen Horney: Optimism: Karen Horney focused on human growth and self-actualization. she challenged
Freud’s view of women and stated that each sex has attributes to be admired by others and neither sex can be
viewed as superior or inferior. Her view of personality has various aspects:
i. Women were affected more by social and cultural factors and less by biological factors.
ii. She argued that psychological disorders are caused by disturbed interpersonal relationships during
childhood.
iii. Basic anxiety results from parent’s indifferent, discouraging and erratic behavior towards child.
This results in basic hostility towards parents.
3. Alfred Adler: Lifestyle and Social Interest: Adler called his theory ‘Individual psychology’. The basic
assumption of this theory is that human behavior is purposeful and goal directed; we have the capacity to
create our own personal goals. According to Adler, the goals provide with security and help us overcome the
feeling of inadequacy. Adler stated that every individual goes through ‘inferiority complex’, i.e., a feeling of
inadequacy and guilt. Overcoming this complex is necessary for optimal development.
4. Eric Fromm: The Human Concern: He viewed humans as social beings that could be understood in terms of
the relationships they have with others. He argued that humans have an innate desire for freedom, justice and
truth, those results in growth and realization. Fromm stated that a person’s dominant characteristic helps in
shaping the cultural processes and culture.
5. Eric Erickson: Search for identity: Erickson gave the theory of psychosocial development, consisting of 8 stages
lasting throughout life. Each stage has a conflict that needs to be resolved, success in which results in development
of a particular virtue. Erickson viewed development as a lifelong process. He argued that people have a central
perspective that can give them meaningful sense of unity and purpose.
Criticism of psychodynamic approach:
1. Theories are largely based on case studies and lack a scientific basis.
2. They have used small and rare case sample size.
3. The concepts are not properly defined.
4. Freud has used male as the prototype of all human personality development.

V. Behavioral Approach
1. This approach relies on data that are definable, observable and measurable. There focus is on learning of
stimulus response connections and their reinforcement.
2. Personality can be best understood as the response of an individual to the environment. This approach
sees the development as a change in response characteristics.
3. This approach believes that an individual’s personality is the result of their interaction with the society.
4. Behavioral approach deals with behavior and actions rather than thought an feelings behind those actions.
5. Behavioral approach believes that personality is shaped by reinforcement in form of reward or
punishment.
6. The structural unit of personality is response, each response is a behavior, which is emitted to satisfy a
specific need.
7. There are various theories that view learning and maintenance of behavior from different angles:
a. Classical conditioning: Ivan Pavlov
b. Instrumental conditioning: B.F. Skinner
c. Observational learning: Albert Bandura

VI. Cultural Approach

1. This approach views personality in relation to the features of ecological and cultural environment.
2. It proposes that a group’s economic maintenance system is important in the origin of culture and behavioral
variations.
3. Ritual, ceremonies, religious practices, arts, recreational activities, games and play are the means through
which people’s personality gets projected in a culture.
4. People develop various qualities and traits in an attempt to adapt to cultural features of a group.
5. People belonging to a single culture tend to share certain traits.

VII. Humanistic Approach

1. This approach is based on individual conscious experiences from which people develop their self-concept.
2. In believes in the basic goodness and respect of mankind, understanding and acceptance of one’s own
existence.
3. Humanistic approach emphasizes on subjective meaningful and personal responsibility.
4. It is based on the assumption that present is the most important aspect of a person.
5. It is concerned for positive growth.
6. Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow have particularly contributed to the development of humanistic perspective
on personality.
7. Rogers believes that fulfillment is the motivating force for personality development. In his theory roger made
two basic assumptions:
i. Behavior is goal directed and worthwhile.
ii. People will almost always choose adaptive and self-actualized behavior.
8. Rogers believed that people express their fullest potential and the fulfillment is the motivating goals for
personality development.
9. Roger also gave self as an important concept, that people constantly engage in the process of acquiring their
true self.
10. Development of self-concept is very necessary for development of behavior. After the development of self-
concept, person exists as a spate entity.

Ideal Self:
1. Roger also suggested that each person has a concept of ideal self. It is an idealized version of oneself
created out of experiences, society and their role models.
2. The person’s ideal self may not be consistent with what actually happens in life and experiences of life.
3. His basic principle is that people have a tendency to maximize self through self-actualization. In this
process thee self grows, expands and becomes more social.
4. When the social conditions are positive the self-concept and self-esteem are high.
5. There two conditions with self:
 a. Congruent b. Incongruent

a. Congruent: The self-image is closer to ideal self, i.e., this is a well-adjusted person. This person is
closer to self-actualization.
b. Incongruent: The self-image is far from the ideal self, i.e., this is a poorly adjusted person.
6. Roger introduced the concept of ‘unconditional positive regard’ in order to enhance people’s self-concept.
Therefore, roger created ‘the client-centered therapy’ in order to create this condition.
7. Abraham Maslow stated that self-actualization is when people reach to their fullest potential.

ASSESSMENT OF PERSONALITY

1. Assessment is the procedure to evaluate or differentiate people on the basis of certain characteristics. Personality
assessment aims at understanding the personality of an individual.
2. The goal of assessment is to understand and predict the behavior with minimum error and maximum accuracy.
3. The most commonly used techniques of assessment are psychometric tests, self-report measures, projective
techniques and behavioral analysis.
I. Self-Report Measures: These are test that are structure and are verbal, they use rating scales. In this method
the subject is asked to respond to a set of item attributing to their own feeling, situation or reactions. These
tests are scored in quantitative terms and are interpreted on the basis of norms developed for the test. Some
self-report measures are:
1. The Minnesota Multiphasic Inventory (MMPI): This test was developed by Hathaway and McKinley as a
tool for psychiatric assistance. It was revised as MMPI-2, that consisted of 567 statements. The tests was
divided into 10 subscales which seek to diagnose-
i. Hypochondriasis
ii. Depression
iii. Hysteria
iv. Psychopathic deviate
v. Masculinity-femininity
vi. Paranoia
vii. Psychasthenia
viii. Schizophrenia
ix. Mania
x. Social introversion

This scale was adopted in India by Mallick and Joshi as Jodhpur Multiphasic Inventory (JMPI).

2. Eysenck’s Personality Questionnaire: the initial version of this test was designed to test on two scales:
i. Introversion - extraversion
 ii. Neuroticism – emotionally stable.
These dimensions were characterized by 32 personality traits. However later, Eysenck’s added a third
dimension: iii. Psychoticism – sociability.
3. Sixteen Personality Factors Questionnaire (16PF): This test was developed by Raymond Cattell. The test
has declarative statement to which the subject responds from a set of given options. This test is used in
career guidance, vocational exploration and occupational testing.

Problems with self-report measures:

1. Social desirability – The participants attempts to respond to items in a socially desirable manner.
2. Acquiescence – When the respondent aggress with the items irrespective of its content.

II. Projective Techniques: Projective techniques were developed to assess unconscious motives and feelings.
These techniques are based on the assumption that a less structured or unstructured stimulus or situation will
allow the individual to project their feelings, desires and needs. They use various kinds of stimulus materials:
1. Reporting associations with stimulus (Inkblot, words, etc.)
2. Story writing around pictures.
3. Sentence completion
4. Expression through drawing
5. Choice of stimulus from a large set of stimulus.

Some of the Projective tests are given below:

1. The Rorschach Inkblot Test: The test was developed by Hermann Rorschach. The test consists of 10
inkblots. 5 are black and white, 2 have red ink and 3 are in pastel colors. The blots are symmetrical,
each blot is printed in the center of a white cardboard of 7in X 10in , however, they were originally made
by dropping the ink on a piece of paper and folding it. These are administered in two phases:
a. Performance Proper: The subjects are shown the cards and are asked what they see.
b. Inquiry: Then, a detailed report is prepared on where, how and why a particular response was
made.
2. The Thematic Apperception Test (TAT): This test was developed by Morgan and Murray. The test
consists of 30 black and white picture cards and 1 blank card. Each card has a situation, people or
situation in which the subject is asked to tell a story describing the picture. 20 cards are usually
administered on an adult at a time. After this, a standardized procedure is followed to score and
interpret TAT. Uma Chaudhary has adopted an Indian version of TAT.
3. Rosenzweig’s Picture-Frustration Study (P-F study): This tests was designed to assess how people
express aggression in frustrating situation. Developed by Resenzweig, this test uses cartoon like
pictures to present a series of situations where one person frustrates another. The subject is asked
when the frustrated person will say. The analysis of response is based on the type and direction of
aggression. Pareek has adopted this test for Indian Population.
4. Sentence Completion Test: This test consist of a number of incomplete sentences, the starting is
presented and the subject has to complete the sentence. These ending represents the subject attitude,
motivation and conflicts. This test targets the person’s unconscious motivations and provides several
opportunities to deal with it.
5. Draw – a – Person: The subject is asked to draw the person on a sheet of paper. Then after this, they
are asked to draw someone of the opposite sex. Then, the person is asked to make a story about it.
These interpretations are done with some basic guidelines, for example:
a. Omission of facial feature: Trying to cover up or hide a conflicted relationship that also
carries guilt.
 b. Emphasis on Neck: Lack of Control

III. Behavioral Analysis: Behavioral analysis is based on observation as a means to assess personality.
1. Interview: Interview involves talking to a person face to face, asking them specific questions serving the
aim of the interviewer. Diagnostic interviewing involves in-depth questioning. Interviews are structured and
Unstructured.
i. Structured Interviews: They follow a specific set of questions, in a sequence. In this, the
interviewer cannot add or subtract a question. These may also use rating scales to enhance the
objectivity of evaluation. They are generally closed ended questions.
ii. Unstructured Interviews: They do not follow any specific set of questions. In this, the interviewer
is free to add or subtract any question or change the sequence. This relies highly on observation.
These questions are open ended.

________________________________________ Enjoy!! _____________________________________

CHAPTER 4 : Concept of Abnormality and
psychological disorders
 Psychological disorders are commonly represented by 4 Ds:
 Deviance- Deviant behaviour – different, extreme, unusual, even bizarre)
 Distressing- Unpleasant, Upsetting to the person and the others
 Dysfunctional- Interfering with person’s ability to carry out day to day activities in a
constructive way.
 Dangerous- to himself or others
 History of Psychological disorders:
 Ancient times:
 Supernatural: These disorders were attributed to operation of Supernatural, magical
forces (evil spirits, devil). Exorcism, counter magic, prayers were practised to cure.
 Biological approach: People behave abnormal because their bodies and brains are not
functioning normally.
 Psychological: inadequacies in the way individual feels, thinks, perceives the world.
 Organismic: 4 body fluids imbalance: blood, black bile, yellow bile, phlegm.
 Middle Ages: Demonology & superstitions gained renewed importance.
 Renaissance Period: ( 15th/15th century) emphasised Psychological conflicts – disturbed
interpersonal relationships conflicts and not witches.
 17th/18th centuries: Age of reason & enlightment. Recognised these disorders as medical state
and applied scientific attitude towards them to develop empathy, care towards such people
and cure them. Asylums and reform centres were created.
 Factors underlying normal/abnormal behaviour:
 Biological factors: These factors influence all aspects of behaviour. Faulty genes, endocrine
imbalances, malnutrition, injuries and other conditions may interfere with normal development
and functioning of human body.
 Psychological disorders are often related to problems in transmission of messages from
one neuron to other. When an electric impulse reaches neuron’s ending, the nerve
ending is stimulated to release a chemical called neurotransmitter.

 Abnormal activity in releasing these neurotransmitters can lead to specific

psychological disorders.

 Low activity of neurotransmitter aminobutyric acid ( GABA) leads to Anxiety disorder.

 Access activity of dopamine can cause schizophrenia.
 Low activity of serotonin leads to depression.
 Genetic factors: are linked to mood disorders, schizophrenia, depression, anxiety, mental
retardation and other disorders. It is not proved that there is a specific gene that causes that
disorders, infact it is a combination of genes which are responsible. Also there is a sound
evidence that genes are responsible for all such psychological disorders, but these are not the
only factors.
 Psychological model (psychological and interpersonal factors)-
 Have significant role in causing mental disorders and abnormal behaviour. These
factors include maternal deprivation (separation from mother or lack of warmth during
early years), faulty parent-child relationships (rejection, overprotection,
permissiveness, faulty disciple) maladaptive family ( inadequate or disturbed family),
severe stress.

 Psychodynamic Model– Freud theory

 Is the oldest and most famous model in psychology. This model describes that person’s
behaviour normal or abnormal is determined by psychological forces within which a person is
consciously unaware of. As Freud theory, it is a conflict between Id, Ego and Superego.
 Behavioural model- Psychological disorders are the result of learning of maladaptive ways of
behaving.
  This model concentrates on the behaviours that are learned through conditioning and can also
be unearned. Learning can take place by classical conditioning ( 2 events occur close together
in time), operant conditioning ( behaviour followed by reward).
 Cognitive Model: This model states that abnormal functioning can result from cognitive problems.
People may hold assumptions about themselves that are irrational and inaccurate.
 They may draw assumptions from a past negative event and over generalise and extend to
situations in future.
 Humanistic- existential model- focuses on broader aspects of human existence. It believes that human
being are born with a natural tendency to be friendly (social beings), cooperative, constructive and
are driven to self-actualization. i.e. to fulfil this potential for goodness and growth. Those who shirk
from responsibility live empty, inauthentic and dysfunctional lives.
 Socio- culture factors– social and cultural forces that influence the human beings. Family structure,
communication, social network, societal conditions, war and violence.
 Diathesis Stress model– Diathesis (biological predisposition to disorder) is set off by a stressful
situation. This model has three components.
1. Presence of biological aberration may be inherited.
2. Vulnerability to develop a psychological disorder.
3. Presence of pathogenic stressor, leading to psychopathy.
Such people can develop disorders including anxiety, schizophrenia and depression.
 Types of Disorders
 Anxiety Disorders
 Anxiety is usually defined as a diffuse, vague, very unpleasant feeling of fear and
apprehension.
Symptoms are: rapid heart rate, shortness of breath, diarrhoea, loss of appetite, fainting, dizziness,
sweating, sleeplessness, frequent urination and tremors.

Anxiety is of many types:

1. Generalized anxiety disorder: this consists of prolonged, vague, unexplained and intense fear which
are not attached to any particular object or person.
Symptoms: worry, apprehensive feeling about future, hyper vigilance that involves constantly scanning
the environment for dangers.
2. Panic disorder: recurrent anxiety attacks, feeling intense terror. A panic attack denotes an abrupt
of intense anxiety rising to a peak when thoughts of a particular stimuli are present.
Symptoms: shortness of breath, dizziness, trembling, palpitations, choking, nausea, chest pain or
discomfort, fear of going crazy, losing control or dying.
3. Phobias: People with phobia have irrational fear related to a specific object, people or
situations. Phobia often develops gradually, starts with a general anxiety disorder. E.g. people
scared to climb heights, afraid of deep waters, in an elevator. Can be grouped into 3 types.
Specific phobia, social phobia, agoraphobia.
Specific Phobia– most common. Includes irrational fears of a certain animal, or being in an enclosed
space.
Social Phobia– Intense and incapacitating fear and embarrassment when dealing with other characters.
Agoraphobia– is when people develop a fear of entering unfamiliar situations. Or sometimes afraid of
entering their home.
4. Obsessive compulsive disorder- unable to control their preoccupation with specific ideas or unable
to prevent themselves from repeating a particular act/series of acts that affect their ability to carry
out normal activities.
Obsessive: is when you cannot stop thinking about an idea or a topic, generally unpleasant or shameful.

Compulsive: is the urge to repeat/perform certain behaviours/acts over and over again. E.g. counting a
bundle, order checking, washing hands repeatedly.

5. Post-traumatic stress disorder- Very rarely when some people have been caught in a natural
disaster, floods, earthquakes, tsunami, war, terrorist attack, major accident etc. experience this
disorder.
Symptoms- dreams, flashbacks, impaired concentration and emotional numbing.

Somatoform Disorder:

These are conditions, where there are physical symptoms despite no/absence of any physical disease.
In this the individual has physical difficulties but complains of physical symptoms, for which there is no
biological cause.

These disorders include:

Pain Disorder, somatization, conversion and hypochondriasis

Pain Disorder- report extreme and incapacitating pain without any identifiable biological symptoms. There
are two methods to address this:

1. Active coping– Remaining active and ignoring the pain.

2. Passive coping– Reduced activity and social withdrawal.
Somatization disorder- people with multiple, recurrent or chronic bodily complaints. They tend to present
their complaints in an exaggerated or dramatic way.
e.g. headaches, fatigue, heart palpitation, fainting spells, vomiting and allergies. People with this
disorder believe that they are sick, provide long history of their illness and consume large quantities of
medicines.

Conversion disorder- symptoms are reported loss of part or all of some basic body functions. Paralysis,
blindness, deafness and difficulty in walking are the generally reported symptoms after a sudden
stressful/traumatic experience.
Hypochondriasis- is diagnosed if a person has a persistent belief that s/he is suffering from a serious
illness, despite the medical reassurance, lack of physical findings.
Hypochondriacs have an obsessive preoccupation and concern with the condition of their bodily organs
and they continuously worry about their health.

Dissociative Disorders-

Dissociation can be viewed as severance of the connections between ideas and emotions. It
involves feeling of unreality, estrangement, depersonalization and loss or shift of identity.
They are of 4 categories:

1. Dissociative Amnesia: Extensive but selective memory loss that has no known organic cause like
head injury or anything due to overwhelming stress.
Symptoms- inability to remember the past or specific people, events, places, names.

1. Dissociative fugue: due to unexpected travel away from home or workplace, people sometimes
assume new identity and inability to recall the previous identity. The fugue usually ends when
person returns to regular life or wakes up.
2. Dissociative identity disorder: often referred to as multiple personalities is the most dramatic of
these disorders. It is often associated with traumatic experiences in childhood.
3. Depersonalization: Involves a dreamlike state in which the person has a sense of being separated
from self and reality both.

Mood Disorder
Disturbance in mood or prolonged emotional state. Main type of mood disorders include: depressive,
manic and bipolar disorders.

1. Depressive disorder: The most common mood disorder is depression. Factors that disposition
towards depression could be majorly genetic, heredity. Age and gender are also the factors. Eg.
Women are more susceptible during young adulthood and men during middle age.
Symptoms: Depicts depressed mood or loss of interest or pleasure in most activities, together with
symptoms which include change in body weight, constant sleep problems, tiredness, inability to think
clearly, agitation, greatly slowed behaviour. At times even thoughts of death and suicide. Feeling of
worthlessness or excessive guilt.

1. Mania: Maniac episodes rarely appear by themselves, they usually alternate with depression.
Symptoms: People suffering from mania become euphoric, extremely active, excessively talkative and
easily distractible.
 1. Bipolar: When mania and depression alternately appear, sometimes they are interrupted by periods
of normal mood. This is referred as bipolar mood disorder, earlier referred as maniac – depressive
disorder.
Symptoms: Suicide attempt is the highest. Several risk factors influence this behaviour- mental disorder,
age, gender, ethnicity (Japanese), recent occurrence of serious life event.

Teenagers and those over 70 years are more at risk. Men contemplate suicide attempt more than women.

Q: How can suicides be prevented?

A: Suicides can be prevented by staying alert to some of the symptoms which include:

 Changing in eating and sleeping habits.

 Withdrawal from friends, family and regular activities.
 Violent actions, rebellious behaviour, running away.
 Drug and alcohol
 Marked personality change
 Persistent boredom
 Difficulty in concentration
 Complaints about physical symptoms
 Loss of interest in pleasurable activities.
Paying attention to such symptoms and seeking timely help by professional counsellor/psychologist can
help to prevent the likelihood of suicide.

Schizophrenia Disorders
Schizophrenia is the descriptive term for a group of psychotic disorders in which personal, social and
occupational functioning deteriorates as a result of disturbed thought processes, strange perceptions,
unusual emotional states and motor abnormalities.

Symptoms: can be grouped into 3 categories- Positive ( i.e. excesses of thought, emotion and behaviour),
Negative ( deficit of thought, emotion and behaviour) and psychomotor symptoms.

1. Positive Symptoms: pathological excesses or bizarre additions to a person’s behaviour.

Symptoms: Delusions, disorganized thinking and speech, heightened perception and hallucinations.
Q: What are Delusions:
Delusions – false belief that is firmly held on inadequate grounds.
Delusions of persecution- They believe plotted against, spied on, slandered, threatened, attacked or
deliberately victimized.
Delusions of reference- in which they attach personal meaning to the actions, objects and events
Delusions of grandeur-They believe themselves to be specially empowered.
Delusions of control- They believe their thoughts, feelings and actions are controlled by others.
Q: What are Hallucinations?
A: Perceptions that occur in absence of external stimuli.

They are of several types-

Auditory Hallucinations: Patients hear sounds or voices that speak directly to them.
Tactile Hallucinations: Tingling, burning sensations.
Somatic: Something happening inside the body, such as snake crawling inside stomach.
Visual: Distinct visions of people and objects.
Gustatory: Food or drink taste strange.
Olfactory: Smell of poison or smoke.

1. Negative symptoms: are pathological deficits and include Alogia (reduction in speech content or
poverty of speech), Blunted effect– Less expression of sadness, joy, anger and other feelings.
Flat effect- No emotions and feelings
Loss of volition- Apathy or inability to start or complete any work.
Social withdrawal- become focused on their own ideas and fantasies.
1. Psychomotor symptoms: Less spontaneous, make odd grimaces and gestures. Types:
Catatonic stupor: remain motionless and silent for long durations.
Catatonic rigidity: maintain a rigid upright posture for hours.
Catatonic posturing: assuming odd, awkward positions.
Behavioural and Developmental disorders:
These disorders are specific to children and if neglected can lead to serious consequences later in life.

Why Children: Children have less self-understanding and they have not developed a stable sense of
identity. Nor do they have adequate frame of reference regarding reality, possibility and value. As a result
they cannot cope with the stressful events effectively and hence it reflects in their behaviour and impacts
their development.
Other childhood disorders:
Pervasive Developmental Disorders: in addition children may also suffer from more serious
developmental disorder called Pervasive Developmental Disorders.
Autistic Disorder (Autism)- These children have marked difficulties in social interaction, sharing emotions,
communication skills, interests in activities. 70% of autistic children have chances of being mentally
retarded. Such children may reflect repetitive behaviours such as lining up objects or stereotyped body
movements such as rocking. These movements are self stimulatory.
Eating Disorder:
Anorexia nervosa– Individual has a distorted body self-image and may think s/he is overweight. Hence
avoid eating, starve and over exercise compulsively to lose weight.

Bulimia Nervosa; Individuals eat excessive amounts of food. Then purge with help of eating medicines like
laxatives or diuretics or by vomiting.

Binge eating: There are frequent episodes of out of control eating.

Substance use disorders:

Substance dependence – Intense craving, withdrawal symptoms, compulsive drug/alcohol intake.

Substance abuse- There are recurrent and adverse consequences of taking these substances and
damage their social, family relationships and performance at work.

Alcohol impact:
 All alcohol beverages contain Ethyl Alcohol.
 This chemical is absorbed in the blood and carried into central nervous system and spinal cord.
 It depresses those areas in brain that control judgement, inhibition.
 People become talkative, friendly, lose inhibitions and feel more confident and happy.
 They also become more emotional, loud and aggressive.
 Speech becomes unclear, memory falters and physical movements can become unsteady.
Therefore drinking and driving is not allowed under laws.

Intellectual disability: People with IQ less than 70 show deficit or impairment in adaptive behaviour. Lower
functional, academic skills.