Chapter 13 : Psychology

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Chapter 13 Psychology Health

• Michael L. Farris
• Psychology 101

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Behavioral Medicine (Coon, p. 417)

• The study of behavioral factors in medicine,
  physical illness, and medical treatment.
• Psychologists working in the allied field of
  behavioral medicine apply psychology to manage
  medical problems, such as diabetes or asthma.
• Their interests include pain control, helping
  people cope with chronic illness, stress-related
  diseases, self-screening for diseases (such as
  breast cancer), and similar topics.

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Disease-Prone Personality (Coon, p. 418)

• A personality type associated with poor health
  marked by persistent negative emotions, including
  anxiety, depression, and hostility.
• Such people tend to be chronically depressed,
  anxious, hostile, and frequently ill. In
  contrast, people who are intellectually
  resourceful, compassionate, optimistic, and
  non-hostile tend to enjoy good health.

4
Burnout (Nevid, p. 476)

• A job related condition of mental, physical, and
  emotional exhaustion.
• The problem has three aspects
• emotional exhaustion (affected persons are
  fatigued, tense, apathetic, and suffer from
  physical ailments they feel used up, and have an
  I dont care anymore attitude toward work).
• Depersonalization (or detachment from others), in
  which burned out workers no longer care about
  their clients and coldly treat them like objects.
  And
• Reduced personal accomplishment (burned out
  workers do poor work and feel helpless, hopeless,
  or angry. Their self-esteem slumps and they
  yearn to change jobs or careers.

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Burnout (Coon, p. 424, Nevid, p.476)

• Burnout may occur in any job, but it is a marked
  problem in emotionally demanding helping
  professions, such as nursing, teaching, social
  work, child care, counseling, caring for AIDS
  patients, or police work.
• It is ironic that the same work that produces
  burnout can also be highly rewarding.
• People are more likely to burn out if they feel
  they have little control over their work.

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Frustration

• A negative emotional state that occurs when one
  is prevented from reaching a goal. Frustration
  is a common source of stress.
• A common response to frustration is aggression.
  (Nevid, p.502 Coon, p. 426)

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Scapegoating

• (A scapegoat is a person who has become a
  habitual target of displaced aggression.)
• Scapegoating is blaming a person or group of
  people for conditions not of their making.
• Psychologists attribute much hostility and
  violence to displaced aggression.
• An example of scapegoating is the disturbing
  finding that when unemployment increases, so does
  child abuse.
• (Coon, p. 427)

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Defense Mechanism

• A habitual and often unconscious psychological
  process used to reduce anxiety. Specifically,
  defense mechanisms are used to avoid, deny, or
  distort sources of threat or anxiety. They also
  help protect an idealized self-image so that we
  can comfortably live with ourselves. Many of the
  defenses were first identified by Sigmund Freud,
  who assumed they operate unconsciously. Everyone
  at one time or another has used defense
  mechanisms.
• Defense mechanisms prevent us from being
  overwhelmed by immediate threats.
• Please refer to Nevid, p. 348 or Coon, p. 431.

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Denial

• A basic defense mechanism in which one refuses to
  accept an unpleasant reality.
• Denial is closely linked with death, illness, and
  similar painful and threatening events. If you
  were told you have three months to live, your
  first reaction may be the doctor must be
  mistaken or it cant be true!.
• Similar denial and disbelief are common reactions
  to the unexpected death of a friend or relative
  Its just not real. I dont believe it. I just
  dont believe it! (Nevid, page 347)

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Repression

• Unconsciously preventing painful or dangerous
  thoughts from entering awareness (forgetting).
• Freud noticed that his patients had tremendous
  difficulty recalling shocking or traumatic events
  from childhood.
• Feelings of hostility toward a family member, the
  names of people we dislike, and past failures are
  common targets of repression. (Nevid, p. 348
  Coon, p. 431)

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Reaction Formation

• Preventing dangerous impulses from being
  expressed in behavior by exaggerating opposite
  behavior. In Freudian theory, a defense mechanism
  involving behavior that stands in opposition to
  ones true motives and desires to prevent
  consciousness awareness of them.
• For example, a mother who unconsciously resents
  her children may, through reaction formation,
  become absurdly overprotective and overindulgent.
  Her real thoughts of I hate them and I wish
  they were gone are replaced by I love them and
  I dont know what Id do without them. The
  mothers hostile impulses are traded for
  smother love, so that she wont have to admit
  she hates her children.
• Thus, the basic idea in reaction formation is
  that the individual acts out an opposite behavior
  to block threatening impulses or feelings.
• (Nevid, p. 348 Coon, p. 431)

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Regression

• Retreating to an earlier stage of development or
  to earlier, less demanding habits or situations.
  
• If youve ever seen a child get homesick at
  summer camp or on vacation, youve observed
  regression.
• An adult who throws a temper tantrum or a married
  adult who goes home to mother is also
  regressing. (Coon, p. 432-433)

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Projection

• Attributing ones own feelings, shortcomings, or
  unacceptable impulses to others.
• Projection is an unconscious process that
  protects us from the anxiety we would feel if we
  were to discern our faults.
• A person who is projecting tends to see his or
  her own feelings, shortcomings, or unacceptable
  impulses in others.
• Projection lowers anxiety by exaggerating
  negative traits in others. This justifies ones
  own actions and directs attention away from
  personal failings.
• (Nevid, pgs. 347-348 Coon, p. 432)

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Rationalization

• Justifying personal behavior by giving reasonable
  and rational but false reasons for it.
• The making of excuses comes from a natural
  tendency to explain our behavior. When the
  explanation you give for your behavior is
  reasonable and convincing, but not the real
  reason, you are rationalizing.
• (Nevid, pgs. 347-348 Coon, p. 432)

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Rationalization

• For example, Taylor failed to turn in an
  assignment made at the beginning of the semester
  in one of his classes. Heres the explanation he
  gave his professor
• My car broke down 2 days ago, and I
  couldnt get to the library until yesterday.
  Then I couldnt get all the books I needed
  because some were checked out, but I wrote what I
  could. Then last night, as the last straw, the
  cartridge in my printer ran out, and since all
  the stores were closed, I couldnt finish the
  paper on time.
• When asked why he left the assignment until
  the last minute (the real reason it was late),
  Taylor offered another set of rationalizations.
  Like many people, Taylor had difficulty seeing
  himself without the protection of his
  rationalizations.

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Compensation (Coon, p. 433)

• Counteracting a real or imagined weakness by
  emphasizing desirable traits or seeking to excel
  in the area of weakness or in other areas.
• Compensatory reactions are defenses against
  feelings of inferiority. A person who has a
  defect or weakness (real or imagined) may go to
  unusual lengths to overcome the weakness or to
  compensate for it by excelling in other areas.
• Examples of compensation include Franklin D.
  Roosevelt whose achievements in politics came
  after he was stricken with polio, and Stevie
  Wonder and Ray Charles, both blind, yet very
  successful musicians.

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Sublimation

• Working off frustrated desires or unacceptable
  impulses in substitute activities that are
  constructive or accepted by society.
• For example, a very aggressive person may find
  social acceptance as a professional soldier,
  boxer, or football player. Greed may be refined
  into a successful business career. Lying could
  be sublimated into storytelling, creative
  writing, or politics.
• (Nevid, pgs. 347-348 Coon, p.433)

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Learned Helplessness

• A learned inability to overcome obstacles or to
  avoid punishment learned passivity and inaction
  to aversive stimuli. (See dog example on Coon
  page 433).
• A psychologist named Martin Seligman has
  described this reaction in Vietnam prisoner of
  war camps (Coon p. 433) in which a young marine
  POW was promised release on a certain date if he
  cooperated, then was never released. He became
  depressed, refused to eat or drink, and died
  shortly thereafter.
• (Nevid, pgs. 401-402 Coon, p. 433)

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Depression

• A state of despondency marked by feelings of
  powerlessness and hopelessness.
• Many psychologists (including Seligman) have
  argued that there is a close connection between
  depression and learned helplessness.
• Nevid, pgs. 400-404 Coon, pgs. 434-435

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Psychosomatic Disorders

• Illnesses in which psychological factors
  contribute to bodily damage or to damaging
  changes in bodily functioning. (Coon, p. 440)
• In psychosomatic disorders, physiological damage
  is caused by psychological stress.
• Hypochondria Complaining about illnesses that
• appear to be imaginary.
• The difference between psychosomatic problems and
  hypochondria is that psychosomatic illnesses are
  real (asthma, a migraine headache, or high blood
  pressure can be psychosomatically caused),
  whereas a hypochondriac imagines problems that
  arent really there.
• Severe psychosomatic disorders can be fatal.
  The person who says Oh, its just psychosomatic
  misunderstands the seriousness of stress-related
  diseases.

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Biofeedback

• Information given to a person about his or her
  ongoing bodily activities aids voluntary
  regulation of bodily states.
• Biofeedback is often recommended to an individual
  who would like to learn to control his or her
  high blood pressure.
• This Electronic yoga is described on Coon, page
  441.

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General Adaptation Syndrome (G.A.S.)

• a consistent series of bodily reactions to
  prolonged stress, occurring in three stages
  (alarm, resistance, and exhaustion).
• In the alarm stage, the body mobilizes its
  resources to cope with added stress. The
  pituitary gland signals the adrenal gland to
  produce more adrenaline and noradrenaline. In
  the first phases of the alarm reaction, people
  have such symptoms as headache, fever, fatigue,
  sore muscles, shortness of breath, diarrhea,
  upset stomach, loss of appetite, and a lack of
  energy.
• In the resistance stage, bodily adjustments to
  stress stabilize. Outwardly, everything seems
  normal.
• In the exhaustion stage, the bodys resources are
  drained and stress hormones are depleted. Unless
  a way of relieving stress is found, the result
  will be a psychosomatic disease, a serious loss
  of health, or complete collapse. (Nevid, pgs.
  459-461 Coon, p. 443)

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Stress Management

• The application of behavioral strategies to
  reduce stress and improve coping skills.
• Exercise, meditation, and relaxation are
  important factors in stress management because
  they relieve the physical tension of stress.
• (Nevid, pgs. 475-478 Coon, p. 448)

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Type A Personalities vs. Type B Personalities

• Type A is a personality type with an elevated
  risk of heart disease characterized by time
  urgency, anger, competitiveness, and hostility.
• Type B personality includes all types other than
  type A. A low cardiac risk personality.
• Nevid, pgs. 455-456 Coon, pgs. 441-442