Transcript If you are stressed

Stress & Psychopathology
9.00 Intro Psych
T.Konkle
10 May 2007
Agenda
(1) turn back papers
(2) quiz
(3) stress review
(4) psychopathology
http://youtube.com/watch?v=aaycLWgMX5w
what kinds of stress are there
acute
physical
psychological
chronic
what does psychological stress do to
your body?
activates the sympathetics nervous system
- brain to spine organs blood vessels sweat glands muscles hairs
(goosebumps)
- emergency arousal activation
- four f's flight fright fight, and sex
- releases epinephrine norepinephrine
If you are stressed:
will these help?
a stress ball?
aggression
hostility
planning out your assignments so you know what you have to do next
writing in a diary
going to the beach
meditation
watching a comedy
hanging out with some friends
thinking about your stressors in a different way
which brain area is one of the most
susceptible to damage by stress?
People with PTSD have smaller hippocampi.
Is this due to the stress they went
through or did they have smaller
hippocampi to begin with?
how do we know the answer?
can stress make your hair go white?
• Q. Can Your Hair Turn White from Fright or Turn Gray
Overnight?
• From Anne Marie Helmenstine, Ph.D.,
Your Guide to Chemistry.
• A. You've heard tales of extreme fright or stress turning a
person's hair suddenly gray or white overnight, but can it really
happen? History records that the hair of some condemned
prisoners [e.g., Thomas More (1535) and Marie Antoinette
(1793)] turned white overnight before their executions. However,
I am unaware of any modern reports of this happening. It's
documented your apparent natural haircolor can change over the
course of several weeks/months from conditions that affect your
hormones (such as pregnancy) or from taking certain medications
(like chemotherapy), but can you go gray overnight? Let's look at
the chemistry of hair to answer the question. Hair is a protein that
gets its natural color from the presence of a pigment called
melanin. Anyone who has bleached their hair can tell you it's
chemically possible to render the melanin colorless.
http://chemistry.about.com/od/chemistryfaqs/f/whiteovernight.htm
• Therefore if your sudden fright has
something to do with exposure to ionizing
radiation or bleach, I can see white hair
being a possible outcome, though less likely
than baldness or death. Seriously, unless
you are playing with toxic radiation or
chemicals, you can't instantly change your
hair color. Can fear or stress or any
extraordinary emotion change the color of
your hair? Yes, but not instantly. Your
psychological state has a significant impact
on the hormones that can effect the
amount of melanin deposited in each strand
of hair, but the effect of emotion takes a
long time to see. The hair you see on your
head emerged from its follicle a long time
ago. So, graying or any other color change
is a gradual process, occurring over the
course of several weeks, months, or years.
http://chemistry.about.com/od/chemistryfaqs/f/whiteovernight.htm
• Your emotions can't instantly change the color
of your hair, but it is possible you could turn
gray overnight. How? A medical condition
termed "diffuse alopecia areata" can result in
sudden hair loss. The biochemistry of alopecia
isn't well understood, but in people who have
a mix of dark and gray or white hair, the
uncolored hair is less likely to fall out. The
result? A person can appear to go gray
overnight. Although I didn't find any
references on this, the implication to me is
your hair thins or you become bald if you don't
have any gray hair, which for some reason is
less resistant to the effect. Sudden hair loss
can be caused by certain drugs, medical
conditions, or by sudden stress. It tends to
occur over the course of several days/weeks,
but the result is still dramatic.
http://chemistry.about.com/od/chemistryfaqs/f/whiteovernight.htm
Discussion: Belief matters
• result: believing you’re in control of shocks, even if you
aren’t, reduces stress
• result: believing a drug will work, even if it doesn’t,
improves healing
• result: believing life is getting better, even if you don’t
know if it will or not, reduces stress
• result: believing a situation is a learning opportunity, rather
than a harmful thing, will reduce stress
Question: Can you make yourself believe something, or
do you have to be told it by some one else?
Psychopathology
the study of
mental illness
mood or affective disorders, anxiety
disorders, psychotic disorders,
eating disorders, developmental
disorders, personality disorders, and
many other categories
The DSM has also been criticized for
allegedly classifying behaviors that
are simply unacceptable in the
society of that time such as
homosexuality (listed in the DSM
until 1974).[23] Furthermore the
potential of conflict of interest has
also been questioned. Roughly 50%
of the authors who previously defined
psychiatric disorders have had or
have relations with drug
companies.[24]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statisti
cal_Manual_of_Mental_Disorders
Thinking about mental disorders
Question: Is it right to think of these as
disease? Why or why not?
but… consider ‘female hysteria’
take diabetes:
Diabetes results from lack of the
hormone insulin, which is essential
for the transfer of glucose from the
blood to the tissues.
Female hysteria was an incorrectly
diagnosed medical condition in Western
medicine that is not currently
acknowledged by the medical community.
It was a popular diagnosis in the Victorian
era for a wide array of symptoms including
faintness, nervousness, insomnia, fluid
retention, heaviness in abdomen, muscle
spasm, shortness of breath, irritability, loss
of appetite for food or sex, and a "tendency
to cause trouble"
Water massages as a
treatment for hysteria c.
1860
The profound reality:
A prevalent view:
well, if you can see a
difference in the brain in
people that have
depression and people that
are normal, then it
depression must be a
disease and not a social
problem.
“Whether it's society driving it
or biological marker, the brain's
going to show it! Who we are is
in our brains. because there's a
brain difference, it doesn't tell
you if it's a top down social
disease or a biological bottom up
disease.” – J.G.
Lets talk about treatment.
TRUE or FALSE: you know if you’ve got the right diagnosis for a mental
disorder if the person responds to treatment.
False: Sometimes this is true. For example, neuroleptic drugs given to
schizophrenics block DA receptors, which as lead to the dopamine theory of
schizophrenia.
But, in the case of ADHD, ritalin helps children with ADHD but also helps normal
children (e.g. the false alarm task, from lecture).
So, Schizophrenics are treated with neuroleptic drugs which keeps extra DA out of
the system.
Is this the same as giving insulin?
Does this fix the problem of schizophrenia?
No. Side effects of treating
Schizophrenia are tardive
diskensia. (or clozapine which
risks liver and immune
system)
“no drug 'treats' a disease.
they all 'manage' a disease.
they all have side effects.”
- J.G.
More treatment
We know that mental disorders have a biological basis, because minds come
from brains.
But, if these are mental disorders, can we treat them mentally?
disorder
what works best
OCD
therapy
Depression
Drugs and Therapy
ADHD
drugs
question: when should
you use a drug and when
shouldn't you?
in most cases it depends. any
extreme position is not going
to capture the reality present
in the data.
Discussion
What are the symptoms of Autism?
How prevalent is it?
Should we treat Autism?
Or, is autism just a different way of being in the world?