The term ‘abnormal’ means deviating from the average. Therefore, if we were to adopt a literal approach to defining abnormality, we would conclude that any rare behaviour or ability was abnormal. This, however, is not a useful way of defining abnormality as it doesn’t take into account whether or not the behaviour is desirable. There are three ways of defining abnormality; deviation from social norms, failure to function adequately and deviation from ideal mental health.…
Abnormality is deviating from what is considered the normal or usual behaviour as a society, normal is a statistical standard defined by what society are managing and what society considers socially acceptable or deviant or what the standard of adequate functioning meaning are they capable to cope with everyday life? There is a concept of ideal mental health this is a state of contentment we all strive to achieve. Abnormal behaviour can be understood by the biological and psychological models of abnormality these consider explanations to why people suffer with mental illness; mental illness is defined by a condition which causes serious disorder in a person’s behaviour or thinking, the…
The psychodynamic approach states that abnormality is caused by our libido (sexual desires) and our thantos (aggressive desires), these are our id desires. The id is an irrational part of our personality and demands satisfaction and is ruled by the pleasure principle. The ego is a conscious part of the personality, as a child interacts with the world and the constraints of reality. It is therefore governed by the reality principle. The superego embodies our conscious sense of right and wrong. The id, ego and superego work together, for example, if there was some money on a table with a person sat at the table with it, your id desire would be to just go over and take the money. Then your ego would step in and realise the constraints of reality and tell you to wait until no one is looking and then take the money. However, your superego would then step in and tell you that it is wrong to steal and you shouldn’t do it and that your parents taught you not to steal. Abnormality stems from an imbalance in these three things, for example, anxiety disorders can be caused by an over developed superego.…
Even though abnormal psychology is a highly controversial aspect of psychology, often challenges define and classify normal and abnormal behavior. Abnormal psychology has evolved into a scientific discipline and several theories have advanced our comprehension of psychology through theoretical models. Abnormal psychology is defined as a branch of psychology that correlates with psychopathology and abnormal behavior. The word describes a broad range of illnesses, from depression to obsession-compulsion, to sexual deviance and several more. Certified counselors, clinical psychologists and psychotherapists often…
The biological approach sees abnormality as a physical illness and removes psychological blame and responsibility for the behaviour form the patients.…
To help illustrate our research on abnormal psychology, this section will compare and contrast normal and abnormal psychology. Normal psychology focuses on the different ways different people see life and want to live life, rather than relying on generalizations made about whole populations of people. These generalizations can often do harm because without proper consideration they can often imply norm of behavior inimical to a person’s existence. A normal psychology in this way doesn’t imply a perfect individual existence, nor that there aren’t any pathologies.…
Deviation from social norms is one definition of abnormality, according to this definition you are considered to be 'abnormal' if you engage in a behaviour that the rest of society does not as society has accepted specific patterns of behaviour that they consider to be 'normal' such as being polite, going to work and education and more.…
The biological or medical approach regards abnormality as illness or disease. Mental illness is thought to be related to the physical structure and functioning of the brain. There are four possible causal factors of abnormality: brain damage, infection, biochemistry and genes.…
“Deviance in sociological context describes actions or behaviors that violate cultural norms including formally-enacted rules (e.g., crime) as well as informal violations of social norms.”…
This is not a true definition of abnormality, but a way of determining the extent of someone’s problems and the likelihood that they might need professional help. But may not be dysfunction alone that encompasses abnormality e.g. some people starve themselves in protest.…
There are many ways a person could be described as psychologically abnormal. There is a statistical infrequency which states that a person’s trait that is rare or statistically unusual could be described as abnormal. For example, a person with an IQ that is above or below the average IQ of society could be considered abnormal. A person with a higher IQ wouldn’t necessarily be considered abnormal, but they would be highly regarded for their intelligence. Violating social norms could be classified as abnormal if it violates what is accepted or expected in society. An example of violating what is normal could be a person who is wearing their clothes backwards. It is not necessarily against the law, but more unacceptable to society and their standards.…
“Cultural Norm” is known as an acceptable behavior, beliefs, and expectation in society. For an example, if you go into a grocery store you would expect to see a woman wearing women’s clothing and a man wearing men’s clothing. But if you walked in and saw a man wearing a dress, you may be taken back for a moment. This deviance is what we recognize as a violation of cultural norm. Something that is out of the norm, not expected, unwanted, or even seen as breaking the rules…
Being abnormal is defined as being different from what is normal, and is typically unwanted behavior to most of society. Abnormal behavior has many different factors to it’s definition. Showing impairment, giving distress and qualifying the quantitative differences are characteristics in individuals that are diagnosed with ADHD. Those behavioral characteristics in an individual would characterize that person as being abnormal.…
According to the sociocultural model, abnormal behavior is best understood in light of the broad forces that influence an individual (Comer, 2015), examining the effects of society and culture. Wherein, the sociocultural model is composed of two major perspectives: (a) the family-social perspective which suggests that social labels, roles, connections, supports, family structure and communication can greatly influence abnormal functioning, and (b) the multicultural perspective which seeks to understand how culture, race, ethnicity and gender can affect thoughts and behaviors, in addition to, how they differ psychologically (Alegria et al., 2014).…
In today society social norms are little things in life that make people feel comfortable and help them to go through everyday activities. Social Norms are beliefs about what is acceptable in society. They are rules that a group uses for appropriate and inappropriate values, beliefs, attitudes and behaviors. These rules may be explicit or implicit. People often associate the most memorable behavior with the majority behavior and hence the rules about that is normative in that social context.…