Transcript 16.2 Anxiety Disorders

16.2 Anxiety Disorders
• Anxiety: a vague, generalized
apprehension or feeling that one is
in danger.
• -out of proportion to the situation
• -most common mental illness: 40
million American annually.
• Anxiety Disorders Include:
• Generalized anxiety disorder, phobic
disorder, panic disorder, obsessivecompulsive disorder, and posttraumatic stress disorder.
• Panic attacks can include:
Choking sensations, chest pain, dizziness,
trembling, and hot flashes.
Why?
-some theorists stress the role of learning in
producing anxiety.
-some believe it is partly inherited.
-environmental factors: such as traumatic
experiences in childhood.
-uncertainties of modern life.
Phobia: an intense and irrational fear of a
particular object or situation.
•
Specific phobias: can focus on
almost anything including high
places (acrophobia), or enclosed
spaces (claustrophobia).
•
Social Phobias: fear that they will
embarrass themselves in a public
place or social setting.
•
Agoraphobia: fear of open spaces.
•
Panic Disorder: an extreme
anxiety that manifests itself in the
form of panic attacks.
• -during a panic attack, a victim
experiences sudden and
unexplainable attacks of intense
anxiety, leaving the individual to feel a
sense of inevitable doom.
• Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder:
• Obsessions: a recurring thought or
image that seems to be beyond
control.
• Compulsions: an apparently
irresistible urge to repeat an act or
engage in ritualistic behavior such as
hand washing.
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
(PTSD) disorder in which victims of
traumatic events experience the
original event in the form of dreams
or flashbacks.
• Common among: veterans,
survivors of terrorism, natural
disasters, or other catastrophes.
• Symptoms: involuntary flashbacks
or recurring nightmares.
• *Social support may protect a victim
of trauma from psychological
aftereffects.
• -18% of American soldiers who
fought in Iraq will develop PTSD.