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Clinical Psychology: Psychopathology by Systematically Examining the

History, Classification, Causes and Treatment of Psychological Disorders

Dr. Nancy Agens, Head,

Technical Operations, Pubrica

sales@pubrica.com

I. WHAT DO WE THINK? WHAT DO WE

FEEL? HOW DO WE REACT TO A

PARTICULAR SITUATION?

All these are related to our mind. Yes,

our emotions, manifestation of behavior,

emotions, and feelings are related to our

mind and the scientific study of our mind is

called Psychology.

This scientific study has several

branches of which clinical psychology is

very important. This is the broad branch of

psychology that focuses on the diagnosis

and treatment of mental, emotional, and

behavioral disorders.This is also knownas

experimental or behavioral science.

Psychopathology is a common term

in the study of clinical psychology.

II. HOW DO WE DEFINE IT?

This is the in-depth Study of Mental

health.orbehavioral disorder which causes

distress in several domains of life. This

study includes symptoms, behaviors, causes,

development, treatment, etc.

III. HOW TO EXAMINE WHETHER

SOMEONE IS A PATIENT OF MENTAL

ILLNESS OR NOT?

For this, a comprehensive assessment

or systematic examination of History is

required.

This assessment consists of two

sections of which the first one is a section of

History that includes how the present

symptoms have evolved, review of past

treatments, past and present medical

conditions, family history of psychiatric

problems and treatment, personal history of

the patient.

IV. LET’S HAVE A LOOK AT HOW TO

DO A PATIENT’S HISTORY EXAMINED

SYSTEMATICALLY

Identification: Information about

patient’s age and sex, mainly racial or ethnic

information, and sometimes includes

religious affiliation.

Chief Complaint: a voice recording

of the patient that describes why he or she

seeks treatment.

History of the Present Illness: a

chronological description from when and

how the symptoms have progressed. The

character of the symptoms must be

described in detail.

Past Psychiatric History: includes

previous incidents and symptoms, treatment,

etc.

Medical history: Medical history is

also important because sometimes a person's

illness or major surgery may cause mental

disturbances.

Family history: mental disorders can

be genetic so family history may help to

diagnose and proper treatment.

Personal History: it has a very

significant role as it describes events

throughout a person’s life.

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V. CLASSIFICATION

In ancient ages, it was believed that

unusual and strange behaviour was due to

the possession of evil spirits. During the

eighteenth and nineteenth centuries,

physicians began to identify symptoms and

classified them as a disease.

In the twentieth century, two new

approaches were contributed by German

physician Emil Kraepelin and Sigmund

Freud which have major influences in the

understanding and classification of

psychopathology(Eldar, GOmez, &

Hofmann, 2017).

VI. THE MAIN CLASSES OF MENTAL

ILLNESS ARE

Mood Disorders:Includes

disturbance of mood, this is divided into

depressive and bipolar disorder.A new

diagnosis of mood disorder has been

reported among children and adolescents.

These patients are having severe non

episodic irritability with bipolar disorder.

This type of disorder is called Disruptive

mood dysregulation disorder

(DMDD)(Tourian et al., 2015).

Anxiety Disorders:These are characterized

by excessive worry about some imaginary

outcome,these may be general,social anxiety

or panic disorder.

Obsessive-Compulsive Spectrum

Disorders: These include trichotillomania

(hair-pulling disorder),body dysmorphic

disorder (BDD), hoarding disorder, and

excoriation (skin-picking) disorder.

Trauma and Stressor Disorders

(Including Dissociative Disorder): These

occur due to guilt, rage, and shame, stressful

events, etc.

Somatic Disorders:Acute pain that

does not have any anatomical or

neurophysiological origin is labeled as

psychopathological(Katz, Rosenbloom, &

Fashler, 2015).The characteristics of this

disorder are anxiety or distress and

symptoms are pain or fatigue.

Feeding and Eating Disorders: These

disorders affect the normal food habits that

impair physical health and also psychosocial

functions.

Sexual disorder: This is distorted

sexual behavior which is very difficult to

differentiate from normal sexual behavior.

Schizophrenia Spectrum and

Other Psychotic Disorders:This is a very

complicated syndrome affecting 1% of the

population.

Personality Disorders:These orders

are related to a persistent pattern of behavior,

emotions, etc and these affect social

relationships.

Sleep-Wake Disorders:This has

been reported that up to 60% of adults are

suffering from sleep problems due to

different stress, lifestyle, physiological

conditions etc. Most of them remain

undiagnosed and untreated(Demir et al.,

2015).

Neurodevelopment disorders: Usually begin in infancy or childhood.

Examples are attention-deficit/hyperactivity

disorder (ADHD) , autism spectrum disorder,

and learning disorders.

Neurocognitive/Organic

Disorders:The two main categories of these

disorders are Delirium and Dementia that

occurs due to brain injury. Impaired

consciousness and cognition are the main

characteristics of Delinium. Symptoms of

Dementia is a continuous deterioration of

brain function.

VII. CAUSE OF PSYCHOLOGICAL

DISORDER

It is very difficult to detect the exact

cause of psychological disorders, but several

factors influence their development. The

main factors are

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Inherited traits: psychological disorder is

common in people who have relatives

having the same problem. It can be

inherited from relatives.

Environmental exposures before birth:

Exposure to some factors like

environmental stress, toxins, alcohol,

drugs can cause mental illness.

Brain chemistry: Neurotransmitter is a

chemical that transmits signals from one

part to another part of the brain.

Impairment of this network system

changes the function of the nerve system

and causes mental depression and mental

disorder.

Analyzed Data has been suggested at

the highest rate of premature death due to

both natural and unnatural causes. The death

rate from unnatural causes is significantly

high in the case of schizophrenia and major

depression. This rate has been increased for

mental retardation and epilepsy. It is

estimated that 14.3% of deaths all over the

world i.e. approximately 8 million deaths

per year happen due to mental

illness(Walker, McGee, & Druss, 2015).

VIII. TREATMENT

Treatment depends on the type of

psychological disorder. Treatment from a

primary care provider may be sufficient for a

patient of mild mental illness. But in severe

mental illness like schizophrenia team

approach is very much important to meet

psychiatric, medical and social needs.

IX. THE CATEGORIES OF TREATMENT

ARE AS FOLLOWS

Medications: psychiatric medication

never cures mental illness but improves

symptoms. The medications are

Antidepressants, Anti-anxiety

medications, Mood-stabilizing

medications., Antipsychotic medications.

Psychotherapy: this is the talking therapy

through which one can learn his or her

moods, thoughts, feelings, behavior, etc.

It is effective to gain knowledge about

stress management skills.

Brain-stimulation treatments: These

include deep brain stimulation and vagus

nerve stimulation. repetitive transcranial,

electroconvulsive therapy, magnetic

stimulation. These may be effective in

some severe cases.

Hospital and residential treatment

programs: in case of severe condition

patients have to be admitted to hospital

or kept under residential care.

REFERENCE

[1] Demir, A. U., Ardic, S., Firat, H., Karadeniz, D., Aksu,

M., Ucar, Z. Z., … Itil, O. (2015). Prevalence of

sleep disorders in the Turkish adult population

epidemiology of sleep study. Sleep and Biological

Rhythms, 13(4), 298–308. Retrieved from

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1111/sbr.12118

[2] Eldar, S., GOmez, A. F., & Hofmann, S. G. (2017).

Psychopathology and classification. In International

perspectives on psychotherapy (pp. 1–33). Retrieved

from https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-

3-319-56194-3_1

[3] Katz, J., Rosenbloom, B. N., & Fashler, S. (2015).

Chronic pain, psychopathology, and DSM-5 somatic

symptom disorder. The Canadian Journal of

Psychiatry, 60(4), 160–167. Retrieved from

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/07067

4371506000402

[4] Tourian, L., LeBoeuf, A., Breton, J.-J., Cohen, D.,

Gignac, M., Labelle, R., … Renaud, J. (2015).

Treatment options for the cardinal symptoms of

disruptive mood dysregulation disorder. Journal of

the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent

Psychiatry, 24(1), 41. Retrieved from

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC435

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[5] Walker, E. R., McGee, R. E., & Druss, B. G. (2015).

Mortality in mental disorders and global disease

burden implications: a systematic review and meta-

analysis. JAMA Psychiatry, 72(4), 334–341.

Retrieved from

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icle-abstract/2110027