Psychopathology

THE SPECIFICATION: (click on links to open notes for each individual part of the specification.)

• Definitions of abnormality, including deviation from social norms, failure to function adequately, statistical infrequency and deviation from ideal mental health. 
• The behavioural, emotional and cognitive characteristics of phobias, depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). 
• The behavioural approach to explaining and treating phobias: the two-process model, including classical and operant conditioning; systematic desensitisation, including relaxation and use of hierarchy; flooding.
• The cognitive approach to explaining and treating depression: Beck’s negative triad and Ellis’s ABC model; cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT), including challenging irrational thoughts.
• The biological approach to explaining and treating OCD: genetic and neural explanations; drug therapy.