1. Course Introduction, History, and Research Methods
PSY 436
Abnormal Psychology
Instructor: Emily Bullock Yowell, Ph.D.

2. What is Normal?
What is Abnormal?

3. What is Abnormal Psychology?
Example Definition
Abnormal Psychology: The branch of psychology that studies abnormal behavior and ways of helping people who are affected by psychological disorders (Nevid, Rathus, & Green, 2006, p. 4)
The Journal of Abnormal Psychology
Society’s Definition of Abnormal Behavior
Medical Model of defining vs. the psychological or sociocultural models
Psychiatrist vs. Psychologist

4. Classification Criteria
Cultural Relativism
Unusualness
Social Deviance
Faulty Perceptions or Interpretations of Reality
Significant Personal Distress/discomfort
Maladaptive or Self-Defeating Behavior
Dangerousness
Statistical Deviation
Not Ideal Behavior
Medical or mental Illness

5. Cultural Considerations
Examples of cultural differences
Implications for assessment
Higher incidents of diagnosis among some groups

6. Warning
You may wonder if you are abnormal!
See pg. 11 in Text

7. History Demonological Model Hippocrates-break from Demonological
Phlegm, black bile, excess blood, and yellow bile
Medieval Times
Witchcraft

8. History Asylums Reform Movement and Moral Therapy
Community Mental Health, deinstitutionalization, and the role of psychotropics
Links of interest

9. Research
Rosenhan's famous 1973 study "On Being Sane in Insane Places" (Science, 179, )
CATIE Trial

10. The Scientific Method Formulate a question
Frame question into a hypothesis
Test the hypothesis
Draw conclusions about the hypothesis

11. Ethics in Research IRB Informed Consent Confidentiality

12. Research Methods Correlation vs. Causation
Naturalistic Observation (Rosenhan)
Qualitative Studies
Correlational method
Longitudinal Studies
Experimental Method
Case Studies
Heredity vs. Environment (Kinship Studies)