Abnormal Psychology

Abnormal psychology is the study of mental disorders (also called mental illness, psychological disorders or psychopathology) – what they look like (symptoms), why they occur (etiology), how they are maintained, and what effect they have on people’s lives.
Mental disorders are surprisingly common. For example, a study conducted by the World HealthOrganization examined the prevalence, or frequency, of mental disorders in people visiting medical doctors in primary care settings in 14 countries. the study revealed that 24 per cent of these people had diagnosable mental disorders and another 10 per cent had severe symptoms of mental disorders (Üstün &Sartorious, 1995).Psychopathology can happen to anyone and affects many people around them – there is no age, race or group that is immune. Furthermore, many people experience more than one disorder at the same time (see figure 15.2).The frequency and widespread suffering caused by mental disorders makes our understanding of them critical.
WHAT DOES ‘ABNORMAL’ MEAN?
Defining abnormality is deceptively difficult. When asked to describe abnormal behaviour, people typically say that it occurs infrequently, is odd or strange, is characterized by suffering, or is dangerous. All of these are reasonable answers for some types of abnormal behaviour, but none of them is sufficient in itself, and making them all necessary results in too strict a definition. One parsimonious and practical way to define abnormal behaviour is to ask whether the behaviour causes impairment in the person’s life. The more a behaviour gets in the way of successful functioning in an important domain of life (including the psychological, interpersonal and achievement/ performance domains), the more likely it is to be considered a sign of abnormality. When several such behaviours or symptoms occur together, they may constitute a psychological disorder. Psychological disorders are formally defined in widely used classification systems, or nosologies: the International Classification of Diseases – 10th edition (ICD-10; World Health Organization,1992) and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders – 4th edition (DSM-IV; APA, 1994). Although they differ from one another in format, these two systems cover the same disorders and define them in a similar manner.
Importantly, both the ICD-10 and the DSM-IV require that the level of impairment a person is experiencing be taken into account when deciding whether they meet criteria for any mental disorder. For example, the DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for depression specify that: ‘The symptoms cause clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning’ (p. 327). The ICD-10 description of depression also states: ‘The extent of ordinary social and work activities is often a useful general guide to the likely degree of severity of the episode’ (p. 121). Finally, it is important to be sensitive to how contextual factors affect judgements about abnormality, so as not to over- or underpathologize groups or individuals. Such factors include ethnicity and culture, gender, age and socio-political values. For example, homosexuality was once listed as a disorder in the DSM, but, as socio-political values changed to become somewhat more liberal and accepting, it was deleted. With a basis for understanding how to define abnormal behaviour, we can focus on its causes. Abnormal behaviour is construed from a number of different perspectives. Each of the following models tells us something about different aspects of a multi-faceted group of mental disorders.