Psychiatry Terms Part 3

This is the 3rd and final part of our Psychiatry term series. 

THINKING

• Goal-directed flow of ideas, symbols and associations initiated by a problem or task and leading toward a reality-oriented conclusion
• Normal thinking is characterized by a logical sequence
• Parapraxis
• Freudian slip
• Unconsciously motivated lapse from logic

§  Considered normal

SOME DISTURBANCES IN FORM OR PROCESS OF THINKING

• Reality testing – objective evaluation and judgment of the world outside the self
• Psychosis – inability to distinguish reality from fantasy; impaired reality testing
• Autistic thinking – preoccupation with inner, private world
• Magical thinking – similar to preoperational phase in children (Jean Piaget); thoughts, words or actions assume power
• Circumstantiality – indirect speech that is delayed in reaching the point but eventually gets from original point to desired goal
• Tangentiality – inability to have goal-directed associations of thought
• Loosening of associations – flow of thought in which ideas shift from one subject to another in a completely unrelated way
• Flight of ideas – rapid, continuous verabalizations or plays on words produce constant shifting from one idea to another

SOME DISTURBANCES IN CONTENT OF THOUGHT

• Delusion

ú  False belief, based on incorrect inference about external reality

ú  Not consistent with one’s intelligence and culutural background

ú  Cannot be corrected by reasoning

• Obsession – pathological persistence of an irresistible thought or feeling that cannot be eliminated from consciousness by logical effort
• Phobia – persistent, irrational, exaggerated and invariably pathological dread of a specific sitmulus or situation

SPEECH

• Ideas, thoughts, feelings as expressed through language

• Communication through the use of words and language

SOME DISTURBANCES IN SPEECH

• Pressured speech – rapid, increased in amount and difficult to interrupt
• Poverty of speech -  restricted amount; replies may be monosyllabic
• Poverty of content of speech – adequate in amount but conveys little information because of vagueness, emptiness or stereotyped phrases

PERCEPTION

• Process of transferring physical stimulation into psychological information
• Mental process by which sensory stimuli are brought to awareness

SOME DISTURBANCES IN PERCEPTION

• Hallucination – false sensory perception not associated with real external stimuli
• Illusion – misperception or misinterpretation of real external sensory sitmuli
• Depersonalization – subjective sense of being unreal, strange or unfamiliar
• Derealization – subjective sense that environment is strange or unreal

MEMORY

• Function by which information stored in the brain is later recalled to consciousness

SOME DISTURBANCES IN MEMORY

• Amnesia – partial or total inability to recall past experiences

ú  Anterograde -  occuring after a point in time

ú  Retrograde – occuring before a point in time

• Paramnesia – falsification of memory by distortion of recall

ú  Deja vu – illusion of visual recognition in which

                                 a new situation is incorrectly regarded as a

                                 repetition of a previous memory

ú  Jamais vu – false feeling of unfamiliarity with a

                                real situation that a person has experienced

LEVELS OF MEMORY

• Immediate – reproduction or recall of perceived material within seconds to minutes
• Recent – recall of ovents over past few days
• Recent past – recall of events over past few months
• Remote – recall of events in distant past

INTELLIGENCE

• Ability to understand, recall, mobilize and constructively integrate previous learning in meeting new situations
• Mental retardation – lack of intelligence resulting in interference with social and vocational performance
• Dementia – organic and global deterioration of intellectual functioning without clouding of consciousness
• Concrete thinking
• Literal thinking
• Limited use of metaphor without understanding of nuances of meaning
• One-dimensional thought
• Abstract thinking
• Ability to appreciate nuances of meaning
• Multidimensional thinking with ability to use methaphors and hypotheses appropriately

INSIGHT

• Ability to understand the true cause and meaning of a situation

LEVELS OF INSIGHT

• Intellectual –understanding of objective reality of set of circumstances without ability to apply understanding in any useful way to master situation
• True emotional – understanding of objective reality of a situation coupled with motivation and emotional impetus to master situation
• Impaired – diminished ability to understand objective reality of situation

JUDGMENT

• Ability to assess a situation correctly and to act appropriately in the situation

LEVELS OF JUDGMENT

• Critical – ability to assess, discern and choose among various options

            in a situation

• Automatic – reflex performance  of an action
• Impaired – diminished ability to understand a situation correctly and to act appropriately

This is the end of our 3 parts Psychiatry term series. Hope it was helpful.