Psychological problems
What's covered
Key facts
Addiction and its explanations: Kaij
The biological explanation of addiction is hereditary factors / genetic vulnerability.
Depression and its treatment: Wiles
Ellis's ABC model stands for Activating event, Belief, and Consequence.
Mental health and its prevalence
A rise in diagnoses may reflect better recognition rather than a true rise in incidence, so increased diagnosis does not always mean increased incidence.
Schizophrenia
Daniel, Weinberger, Jones et al. (1991) ran a double-blind placebo-controlled lab experiment, giving patients with schizophrenia either dextroamphetamine or a placebo.
Addiction and its explanations: Kaij
A key characteristic of addiction is a strong desire to use the substance despite harmful consequences.
Depression and its treatment: Wiles
A strength of CBT over drugs is that it tackles the cause of depression (faulty thinking) rather than only the symptoms.
Mental health and its prevalence
A Centre for Mental Health analysis found the total economic and social cost of mental ill health in England in 2022 was £300 billion.
Schizophrenia
Amphetamine increased activation of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex while patients did the Wisconsin Card Sort Test, even though it reduced blood flow across the brain as a whole.
Addiction and its explanations: Kaij
Addiction is clinically known as dependence syndrome, where substance use becomes the priority despite harmful consequences.
Depression and its treatment: Wiles
CBT focuses on present ("here and now") problems rather than exploring the past.
Practice questions with answers
A taste of the 80 questions in this topic, answers marked. Sign up to practise the full set with spaced repetition.
Which is a defining characteristic of addiction?
- •A complete loss of all long-term memory
- •A lasting improvement in mood and focus
- •A reduced sensitivity to physical pain
- ✓A strong desire to use despite harm
Which best defines unipolar depression?
- ✓A continuous low mood with loss of enjoyment and energy
- •A short-lived sadness that passes within a few hours
- •Anxiety triggered by specific feared objects or situations
- •Mood swinging between extreme highs and deep lows
Which best describes good mental health?
- ✓Coping, good relationships and positive engagement with society
- •Never experiencing any sadness, worry or stress
- •Scoring above average on a personality test
- •Simply having no diagnosed mental illness at present
Brain scans during the Wisconsin Card Sort Test found low activity in which area in schizophrenia?
- •The brain stem
- •The cerebellum
- ✓The frontal lobes
- •The occipital lobes
Which best describes withdrawal in addiction?
- •A strong desire to start using a substance
- •Choosing the substance over other activities
- •Needing more of the substance to feel an effect
- ✓Unpleasant symptoms when use is reduced or stopped
How do SSRI antidepressants increase serotonin in the brain?
- •They add extra serotonin molecules directly to the brain
- ✓They block the reuptake of serotonin at the synapse
- •They speed up serotonin being broken down by enzymes
- •They stop the neuron from ever releasing any serotonin
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