Psych Assignments

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Objective 1: Describe how substances affect the body in addictive disorders

Just as with other aspects of psychology, substance abuse and addiction is viewed through the eyes of the biopsychosocial approach. Go to http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/addiction/mouse/ and see how substances affect the brain and body in different ways.

Learning Activity #2: Substance Abuse Response

  • What biological, psychological, and social-cultural factors help explain why some people abuse mind-altering drugs?
  • Discuss characteristics of various psychological disorders including anxiety and mood disorders as well as schizophrenia

Learning Activity #3: Disorders Response

  • Read Chapter 13 of your textbook.
  • Write 4 paragraphs answering the following:
  • Explain how anxiety disorders differ from normal feelings of stress and tension
  • Contrast major depressive disorder with just “being sad”
  • Describe bipolar disorder taking special care to note the time requirement for depression as well as mania
  • List symptoms of schizophrenia and distinguish between hallucinations and delusions

LEARNING ACTIVITY #4: THERAPY RESPONSE

Mary has come to counseling for treatment. She is very fearful of spiders. It has reached a point that she will often call her husband at work and beg him to come home to kill a spider if she sees it in the house. If she sees a picture of a spiker web, she immediately closes the magazine. Her husband’s boss has warned him that he may get fired if he leaves work again during the day.

Mary is beginning to have nightmares about spiders every night and is now afraid to go to sleep. Her self-worth has plummeted. She is very tired and cranky all day to where it’s starting to affect her relationship with her family. She is seeking counseling from you.

  • Using the above vignette, describe in 1-2 sentences each, how the following therapies would approach counseling with Mary:
  • Psychoanalysis
  • Humanistic Therapies
  • Behaviorist Theories
  • Cognitive Therapy
  • Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
  • Group Therapy
  • Family Therapy
  • Biomedical Therapy

Learning Activity #5: Therapy Discussion

This link will help you with your discussion forum:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2efaHgJ93A

  • Read the follow-up to the case of Mary and spider aversion.

Mary has adjusted after counseling and is back to work as a math professor at OCU. She works in Johnson Hall, one of the oldest classrooms at OCU. She walks in after midterm and she sees a small spider web in the room. She walks out, clinching her chest, feeling her heart beat rapidly. A student walks in the room, sees the spider, and says “Gross! A spider!” and kills the spider. Mary walks back in the room, sees the dead spider, and then prepares for her lesson by turning on the classroom computer and pulling up her PowerPoint lecture for that day. She continues and completes her lesson but keeps an eye on the dead spider out of the corner of her eye. When her lesson is finished, she rushes out of the room.

  • Discuss the following questions:
  • Has counseling worked for Mary? What methods would you use (and not use) to assess if it has worked?
  • What therapy do you think Mary received and why?
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