¶ … biological perspective: suggests that the tendency to develop anxiety disorders may be partly genetic. While environment might have caused the results of the family studies, recent research on brains have shown difficulty with specific neurotransmitters that suggests a problem with the feedback system in the brain that would otherwise quell feelings of fear and panic. Anxiety isn't that simple because several neurotransmitters bind at GABA's receptor as well. Medications can help with anxiety as can relaxation training and biofeedback.
Phobias: enduring but irrational, strong fears of certain objects (ex: snakes) or situations (ex: claustrophobia). Phobias are distinguished from other fears in that they are very intense and cause the person to go to some lengths to avoid the feared thing, which can cause social or even employment problems for the person.
Specific phobia: means the fear is clearly identifiable -- a snake, or high places.
Social phobia: the person is afraid of social situations where they might be embarrassed.
Agorophobia: fear of public places, especially alone. Agorophobia is often accompanied by panic attacks.
What causes phobias? All the models discussed explain phobias according to their philosophy, but classical conditioning, where an event is paired with another stimulus, so that the person reacts to both with fear. So if you were faced with danger while in an elevator, you might then associate closed spaces with danger. Or a person can learn fear from another person (modeling). However, neither has been proven in research. Systematic desensitization, where the person is gradually exposed to more and more fearful examples of the object or situation, can help a person overcome a phobia. Exposure, medication and cognitive therapies can be done with social phobias, as well as social skills training.
Panic Disorder: panic attacks can make the person feel they have no control over what they're doing, or even not be aware of it, or it can include physical symptoms such as rapid heart rate, trouble breathing, sweating, trembling and even chess pains. They can feel dizzy or faint. These might be normal reactions if faced with a truly dangerous situation, but people with panic attacks can have them without any visible reason for the reaction. Neurotransmitter activity is implicated in research but their exact role is not known. Medication and cognitive therapy may help panic attacks.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder: has two main characteristics. Obsessions are repetitive thoughts, ideas, or images. Compulsions are rigid actions done over and over. Acting out the compulsions is soothing to the person. It is more than following a set routine. To be diagnosable it must intrude into the person's life in negative ways. Up to 2% of the population may have OCD. When a person tries to resist the obsession, for instance, repeating having the thought that they wish someone would die, make the person anxious.
The psychodynamic perspective: sees OCD as a battle between the id and ego where id impulses cause an anxiety protective action by the ego.
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