Showing papers in "Journal of Abnormal Psychology in 1977"

Vulnerability--a new view of schizophrenia.

Abstract: Although descriptive and etiological approaches to psychopathology have made notable advances, they seem to have reached a plateau. After reviewing the six approaches to etiology that now preempt the field—ecological, developmental, learning, genetic, internal environment, and neurophysiological models—a second-order model, vulnerability, is proposed as the common denominator, and methods for finding markers of vulnerability are suggested in the hope of revitalizing the field. It is assumed that exogenous and/or endogenous challengers elicit a crisis in all humans, but depending on the intensity of the elicited stress and the threshold for tolerating it, that is, one's vulnerability, the crisis will either be contained homeostatically or lead to an episode of disorder. Vulnerability and episode stand in a trait-state relation, and markers for each must be provided to distinguish between them.

Abnormality as a positive characteristic: The development and validation of a scale measuring need for uniqueness.

Abstract: Need for uniqueness is introduced as a positive striving for abnormality relative to other people. Recent research regarding situational determinants of uniqueness motivation is described, and a dispositional individual-differences measure of need for uniqueness is presented. The development of the Uniqueness Scale aims at insuring construct validity as a guide for the item selection. The internal reliabilities, item-remainder coefficients, test-retest reliabilities, cross-validation information, factor analysis, and discriminant validation data are presented, and all meet the normal psychometric criteria expected of an individual-differences measure. Additionally, eight separate validational studies are presented. Abnormal psychology, as evidenced by the contents of books and journal articles in the area, has typically focused on the negative perspective of deviance. As Sarason (1972) notes in the introductory paragraph of his abnormal psychology text, "The term 'abnormal psychology' has traditionally referred to the study of human failures and inadequacies" (p. 3). While the manifestation of abnormal or deviant behavior is most commonly conceptualized as maladaptive, this need not be the case. One of the problems, however, with the terms abnormality and deviance is that they carry negative connotations (cf. Freedman & Doob, 1968). Therefore, the present article espouses the term uniqueness to circumvent the connotative qualities of abnormality and deviance. By uniqueness, we mean to convey a positive striving for differentness relative to other people. The theoretical underpinning of the uniqueness motivation construct and the de

Nonverbal cues for anxiety: an examination of emotional leakage.

Abstract: Twenty silent 1-minute video segments of psychiatric patients ranging in anxiety levels were shown to 46 raters. Raters were able to identify the presence of anxiety and discriminate varying intensities of anxiety on the basis of nonverbal -cues alone. Nonverbal cues identified as most salient in communicating anxiety were the hands, eyes, mouth, and torso. Additional microanalysis examined how these body areas cued anxiety. Discussion of nonverbal cues for anxiety is couched in terms of Ekman and Friesen's theorizing regarding nonverbal masking and leakage.

Mood-State-Dependent Retrieval of Verbal Associations

Abstract: Retrieval of previously self-generated events in the form of verbal associations was observed to be mood-state dependent in individuals who cycled between states of mania and normality. Recall of associations was more complete during periods of relatively stable mood, including periods of mania, compared to the reproduction of associations that were generated and retrieved during periods of disparate mood. The findings are discussed in the context of moodstate-specific encoding and storage of events and subsequent mood-state-specifk retrieval of experience. Mood states appear to determine how experienced events are processed, stored, and later retrieved from memory (Henry, Weingartner, & Murphy, 1973; Miller, 1975; Murphy, Henry, & Weingartner, 1973). Many of the findings relating mood state, learning, and recall have emerged from the study of patients who demonstrate a bipolarity in mood swings. These patients demonstrate periods of normal mood as well as episodes of depression and mania, with accompanying changes in brain catecholamine activity (Murphy & Redmond, 197S). Learning and memory appear to be disrupted during both the manic and the depressed phase of this disorder, and the extent to which such cognitive changes take place is a function of the intensity of the disturbance in mood (Henry et al., 1973). In a depressed phase, patients appear to be able to attend to input events and to form a temporary memory trace of experience, but they appear to be unable to retrieve experience after periods of delay. However, if these patients are treated with the precursor of the biogenic amine neurotransmitter dopamine, L-dopa, then this specific mood-related facet of the memory-learning deficit appears to be erased, but without an immediate associated lifting of mood (Henry et al., 1973). This finding suggests

The P scale and psychosis.

Abstract: Neuropsychology Unit, Department of NeurologyChurchill Hospital, OxfordH. Eysenck and S. Eysenck's psychoticism (P) scale was appraised. Their claimsof continuity between psychosis and normality are based on a shifting conceptof continuity. At times, Eysenck and Eysenck appear to be arguing for a con-tinuum between psychosis and normality at the level of clinical symptoms. Onother occasions they seem to say that the P scale measures the underlying con-dition responsible for the psychotic symptoms. The evidence is not strong ineither case. If it were, then the P scale would be a useful diagnostic instrument.However, in their most recent work, Eysenck and Eysenck clearly state thatthe P scale measures the predisposition to psychosis, and that "only a verysmall proportion of people with high P scores are likely to develop a psychosis"(p. S). In this case, the P scale cannot be used alone as a diagnostic tool, sinceit does not discriminate the mentally ill from the healthy. The value of the Pscale therefore rests on its validity as a measure of predisposition to psychosis.It is shown that validation data presented by Eysenck and Eysenck are at bestunconvincing and, at worst, contrary to their hypothesis.

Genetic theories and the validation of psychiatric diagnoses: Implications for the study of children of schizophrenics

Abstract: The success of prospective methods for studying the development of schizophrenia in those few offspring of schizophrenics who also become schizophrenic (high-risk method) depends on using valid diagnostic criteria for selecting the parent probands. Data from a high-risk study in which the affected parents were diagnosed by five clinicians are used to illustrate the impact different diagnostic standards may have on the composition of high-risk samples and control samples of children of other psychiatric patients. Publicly reporting careful assessments of affected parents will also facilitate comparisons among different high-risk samples and will allow estimates of the risks for individuals within each high-risk sample. Genetic theory and empirical data suggest that children with severely affected parents and children with many affected relatives will have the highest risks, while samples of children with only one mildly affected parent may have risks that approach the population base rates. Genetic theory further suggests that some children of validly diagnosed schizophrenics will have no genetic risk for schizophrenia, and some of those who do have the genetic predisposition will enjoy a lifetime of adequate mental health even without intervention, thus confounding the effort of high-risk research to validate indicators of the high-risk genotype with follow-up status. High-risk researchers are cautioned against premature implementation of intervention strategies based on unvalidated indicators of the risks to individuals.