VARIATIONS IN PSYCHOLOGICAL ATTRIBUTES

• INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN HUMAN FUNCTIONING:

• Variability is a fact of nature.

Physical Characteristics
• Humans vary in terms of
Psychological Dimensions

• Each one of us is unique and has a typical combination of various traits.

• INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES: Refer to distinctiveness and variations among
people’s characteristics and behaviour patterns.

BEHAVIOURS

Influenced by personal traits. Influenced by situations

SITUATIONALISM

Situations and circumstances in which

one is placed influence ones behaviour.

Views behaviour as a result of external

factors.

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 • ASSESSMENT OF PSYCHOLOGICAL ATTRIBUTES:

• Psychological attributes can be assessed.

• Assessment is the first step in understanding a psychological
attribute.

ASSESSMENT

Psychological assessment uses

Refers to the measurement systematic testing procedures to
of psychological attributes evaluate abilities, behaviours and
of individuals and their personal qualities of individuals.
evaluation, often using
multiple methods in terms
of comparision.

Formal: objective, Informal: subjective

standardized, organized.

• Once assessment is done, behaviour can be predicted.

• If predicted behaviour is not what we want, we can intervene to affect a change in
behaviour.
• The attribute chosen for assessment depends on our purpose.

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 Values are enduring beliefs
about an ideal mode of
behaviour.

Intelligence is the global capacity

to understand the world, think Personality refers to relatively
rationally, and use available enduring characteristics of a
resources effectively when faced SOME DOMAINS IN
PSYCHOLOGICAL person that make her or him
with challenges.
ATTRIBUTES distinct from others.

Interest is an individual’s preference

Aptitude refers to an individual’s for engaging in one or more specific
underlying potential for acquiring skills. activities relative to others.

Values: dominant values of a person

Personality:
Intelligence: WHAT DO THE TESTS OF • Individual’s unique
• Global measure of VARIOUS PYCHOLOGICAL characteristics.
a persons general ATTRIBUTES MEASURE • Explain individual’s
cognitive behaviour.
competence.
• Predict future
• Ability to profit behaviour.
from schooling.

Aptitude: Interest:
• Predict what an • Helps to decide subjects/
individual will be able courses
to do given proper • Making choices that
environment and promote life satisfaction,
training. enhance performance on
3 jobs.
 Self-Report is a method in which a
person provides factual information
about herself/himself and/or opinions,
beliefs, etc. that s/he holds.

Observation involves
employing systematic,
Psychological test is an
organised, and objective
objective and standardised ASSESSMENT procedures to record
measure of an individual’s
METHODS behavioural phenomena
mental and/or behavioural
occurring naturally in real
characteristics.
time.

Interview involves Case Study is an in-depth

seeking information study of the individual in
from a person on a terms of her/his
one-to-one basis. psychological attributes,
psychological history in
the context of her/his
psychosocial and physical
environment.

Robert Sternberg:
The ability to adapt, to shape
and select environment to
Oxford dictionary: accomplish ones goals and
Power of perceiving, those of ones society and
learning, understanding culture.
and knowing. INTELLIGENCE
(DEFINITIONS)

Alfred Binet: Wechsler:

the ability to judge the global and aggregate
well, understand well, capacity of an individual to
and reason well. think rationally, act
purposefully, and to deal
effectively with her/his
environment.

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 • THEORIES OF INTELLIGENCE:

PSYCHOMETRIC INFORMATION PROCESSING

1) Considers intelligence as an aggregate of 1) Describes the processes people use in
abilities. intellectual reasoning and problem solving.
2) Focuses on the structure of intelligence 2) Focuses on how an intelligent person
and its underlying dimensions. acts.
3) Expresses the individual’s performance 3) Studies cognitive functions underlying
in terms of a single set of cognitive intelligent behaviour.
abilities.

Structure of Intellect Model :( 1988) Hierarchical Model

• Classifies intellectual traits among 3 of Intelligence:
dimensions: • Arthur Jensen
Unifactor Theory: 1) Operations: what the respondent does. • Consists of
• Alfred Binet 2) Contents: nature of materials or abilities operating at
• Was a simple theory information on which intellectual two levels:
which arose from his interest operations are performed. 1) Level I:
in differentiating more 3) Products: form in which info is associative learning
intelligent individuals from processed by the respondent. in which input is
less intelligent ones. • This classification includes 6x5x6 more or less similar
• He conceptualized categories = 180 cells. to output.
intelligence as consisting of • Each cell is expected to have at least 2) Level II : cognitive
one similar set of abilities one factor or ability. competence which
which can be used for solving involves higher
any or every problem in an order skills as they
individual’s environment. transform the input
• This theory came to be PSYCHOMETRIC APPROACH
to produce an
disputed when psychologists effective output.
started analysing data of
individuals, which was
collected using Binet’s test Theory of Primary Mental
Abilities:
• Louis Thurstone
Two Factor Theory: (1927)
• Intelligence consists
• Charles Spearman
of 7 primary abilities
• Employed factor
• Each of these is
analysis
relatively independent from
• Showed that others.
intelligence consisted of: • These include:
1) General factors-
1) verbal comprehension
mental operations
2) numerical abilities
which are primary and
3) spatial relations
common to all
4) perceptual speed
performances.
5) word fluency
2) Specific factors- allow
5 6) memory
individuals to excel in
7) inductive reasoning
their specific field.
 • Proposed by Howard Gardener. He defined 8 types of intelligences all independent of each other.

Naturalistic Intrapersonal
Interpersonal

THEORY OF MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES Bodily Kinesthetic

Linguistic

Logical Musical
Spatial

• Proposed by Robert Sternberg in 1985.

• Views intelligence as the ability to adapt, to shape and select environment to
accomplish ones goals and those of ones society and culture.
• 3 basic types of intelligence;

Contextual/ Practical
intelligence:
• Ability to deal
Componential/ Analytical
with environmental
Intelligence:
demands encountered on
• Analysis of a daily basis.
information to solve
• ‘street smartness’
problems.
TRIARCHIC THEORY OF or ‘business sense’
• 3 components:
INTELLIGENCE • Easily adapt to
1) Knowledge
the given environment
Acquisition
• Select a more
2) Meta or higher order
favourable environment
3) Performance
Experiential/ Creative intelligence: • Modify the
• Using past experiences to creatively environment to fit their
solve problems. needs.
• Reflected in creative performance
• Integrate different experiences in an
original way to make new discoveries and
inventions.
• Quickly find out which information is
6 crucial in a given situation.
 • Developed by JP Das , Jack Naglieri and Kirby in 1994.
• Intellectual activity involves the interdependent functioning of 3 neurological
systems aka the function units of the brain.
• Operates on a knowledge base developed either formally or informally from the
environment.
• Processes are interactive and dynamic in nature.
• Each has its own distinctive function.

Planning:
• Essential
Arousal/attention: feature of
• State of arousal is intelligence
basic to any behavior. • Allows us to
• It helps in attending think of possible
to stimuli courses of action,
• Enables to process PASS MODEL implement them and
information. evaluate their
• Optimal level of effectiveness.
arousal focuses our attention • If the plan
to relevant aspects of the fails it can be
problem. modified.
• Too much or too little Simultaneous and Successive Processing:
interferes with attention. • Information can be integrated into the
knowledge system:
1) simultaneously
2) successively

Das and Naglieri have developed a battery of test known as the Cognitive
Assessment System (CAS):
1) Verbal and non verbal tasks to measure cognitive functions presumed to
be independent of schooling.
2) 15-18 years
3) Test results can be used to remedy cognitive deficits of children with
learning problems.

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 INDIVIDUAL INFERENCES IN INTELLIGENCE

Evidence comes from studies on twins and adopted children

HERIDITY ENVIRONMENT

As children grow with age

their intelligence levels
tend to move to that of
their adoptive parents
Intelligence of identical INTELIGENCE: Interplay of
twins reared apart – 0.72 NATURE and NURTURE
Children adopted from
disadvantaged homes into
Intelligence of families with higher socio-
fraternal twins = 0.60 economic statuses exhibit a
large increase in intelligence

Intelligence of brothers Environmental

and sisters = 0.50 deprivation lowers
intelligence
Siblings reared
apart = 0.25

Rich nutrition, good family

Studies on adopted children background and quality of
show that their intelligence schooling increases
is similar to their biological intelligence
parents

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 • There is a general consensus amongst psychologists that intelligence is
the product of complex interaction of heredity (nature) and environment
(nurture)
• Heredity- something that sets a range within which an individual’s
development isactually shaped by the support and opportunities in the
environment.

In 1905
ALFRED
BINET
&THEODORE
SIMON ASSESMENT OF INTELLIGENCE

First
successfully
measured
intelligence Bright child =
MA> CA
In 1908 scale Dull child =
revised – gave MA < CA
concept of Retardation is
Mental age= MA being 2 MA years
Measure of a below the CA
person’s
intellectual
development
relative to people
of his/her age
group.
Chronological
age= CA In 1912 William Stern devised the
Biological age concept of IQ
from birth. IQ= MA/CA x 100

100 is used as the multiplier to

avoid a decimal point.

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 INTELLIGENCE QUOTIENT Very few people have
either a very high IQ or a
very low IQ.

• IQ below 70 – mental
retardation These 2 groups deviate
• IQ above 130 – considerably from the
exceptionally talented normal population in
respect of their cognitive,
emotional and
motivational In the population IQ scores
• IQ scores between 90 of most people tend to fall
and 110 – intelligent characteristics.
in the middle range of the
• Mean of IQ is 100 distribution.

Normal curve is a type of symmetrical

distribution around a central value.

No. of
persons

IQ scores
The frequency distribution for the IQ
scores approximates a bell shaped
curve.

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 VARIATIONS IN INTELLIGENS

Intellectual Deficiency Intellectual Giftedness

1). American Association of 1). Show higher performance –

Mental deficiency – mental outstanding potentialities.
Retardation- significantly sub 2). Study of gifted individuals
average general intellectual began in 1925 by Louis Terman -
functioning existing he followed lives of 1500
concurrently with deficits in children with IQ >= 130. He
adaptive behavior and examined how intelligence was
manifested during the related to occupational success
developmental period. and life adjustment.

2). According to the definition 3). Talent Giftedness

3 features of mentally
retarded are given: narrow term exceptional ability
refers to remark- shown in superior
(i). Significantly sub average able ability in a performance in a
mental functioning. specific field. wide variety of
IQ below 60. areas.

(ii). Deficits in adaptive The highly talented

behavior – persons capacity are called
to be independent and deal prodigies.
effectively with ones
environment.

(iii). During the developmental From a teacher’s point of view

period 0-18 years of age Giftedness

increased increased
ability increased commitment
creativity

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 CHARECTERISTICS OF
Intellectually Deficient Intellectually Gifted

1). Individuals show significant variations in

their abilities from those who can be
taught to work and function with special
attention to those who cannot be trained
and require special attention throughout 1). Show early signs of intellectual
their lives. superiority.
2). Different levels of mental retardation 2). During infancy and childhood:
are: Large attention span.
i). mild retardation (IQ 55-69) Good recognition memory.
development is typically slower than Preference for novelty.
peers. Sensitivity to environmental changes.
Can hold jobs and families Early appearance of language skills.
3). Giftedness id not the same as brilliant
ii). Moderate retardation (IQ 40-50) academic performance.
lag behind their peers in language and 4). Important characteristics.
motor skills Advanced logical thinking, questioning
can be trained in self care, simple social and problem solving behaviour.
and communication skills Advanced logical thinking, questioning
moderate degree of supervision in and problem solving behaviour.
everyday tasks. • High speed in processing information.
• Super ior general isat ion and discr i -
iii). Profound retardation(IQ 25-39) and mination ability.
severe retardation (IQ below 25) • Advanced level of original and creative
incapable of managing life thinking.
needs constant care throughout their • High level of intrinsic motivation and
lives. self-esteem.
• Independent and non-conformist
thinking.
• Preference for solitary academic
activities for long periods.
5). Identifying gifted
Teachers judgment.
School achievement records.
Parent’s interviewing.
Intelligence tests.
Peer and self ratings.
6). To reach full potential require special
attention.
Life and environment programs
Different education programs

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 TYPES OF INTELLIGENCE TESTS
Individual Group Verbal, Culture fair or
An individual A group nonverbal and culture biased
intelligence test intelligence test performance Intelligence
is one which can be An intelligence tests can be
can be administered to test may be fully culture-fair or
administered to several persons verbal, fully culture-biased.
one person at a simultaneously. non-verbal or Many
time. Requires Seek answers fully intelligence tests
the test usually in a performance show a bias to
administrator to multiple choice based, or it may the culture in
form a rapport format. consist of a which they are
with the subject mixture of items developed. Tests
and their from each developed in
feelings, category. Verbal America and
emotions and tests require Europe
consideration. subjects to give represents an
Allow people to verbal responses urban and
answer the test either orally or middle class
orally or in a in a written cultural ethos.
written form or form. Therefore, Hence, educated
manipulate the verbal tests can middle class
objects be administered white subjects
according to the only to literate generally
‘testies’ people. The perform well on
instructions. non-verbal tests those tests. The
use pictures or items do not
illustrations as respect the
test items. cultural
Performance perspectives of
tests require Asia and Africa.
subjects to The norms for
manipulate these tests are
objects and also drawn from
other materials western cultural
to perform a groups.
task.

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 NLEPT has brought out the handbooks in
the area of intelligence, aptitude,
personality, attitudes, and interests. Critical reviews of Indian tests are
published in the form of handbooks.

The National Library

of Educational and
Psychological Tests
(NLEPT) at the
SM Mohsin made INTELLIGENCE TESTING IN INDIA NCERT has
an attempt at documented Indian
constructing an tests
intelligence test in
Sanskrit in 1930 Since then, a number
of tests have either
Long and Mehta been developed or
At about the same adapted from western
prepared a
time, Mahalanobis cultures.
Mental
CH Rice attempted to attempted to
Measurement
standardize Binet’s standardise
Handbook listing
test in urdu and Binet’s test in
out 103 tests of
Punjabi. Bengali.
intelligence in
India that were
available in
various languages.
Attempts were also made
by Indian researchers to
develop Indian norms for
some western tests
including RPM, WAIS,
Alexander’s Passalong,
Cube Construction, and
Kohs’ Block Design.

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 NLEPT has brought out
the handbooks in the area While elementary functions are
of intelligence, aptitude, universal. Higher mental functions like Cultures have a life of
personality, attitudes, and problem solving and thinking are largely their own. They grow
interests. culturally produced and change and in the
process specify what
CULTURE AND INTELLIGENCE will be the end product
of successful intellectual
The cultural
development.
environment
provides a Many theorists have
context for regarded intelligence VYGOTSKY
intelligence as attributes specific
to develop. to the person without
regard to their
Culture provides a
cultural background.
social context in which
people live, grow and
understand the world
The unique features of culture around them.
now find some representation in
culture is a collective system of theories of intelligence.
customs, beliefs, attitudes, and Sternberg’s notion of contextual
achievements in art and or practical intelligence implies
literature. A person’s that intelligence is a product of
intelligence is likely to be tuned culture.
by these cultural parameters.

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 Technologically advanced societies
adopt child rearing practices that foster
skills of generalisation and abstraction,
speed, minimal moves, and mental
manipulation among children.
Some non-western societies value self-reflection
and collectivistic orientation as opposed to personal
achievement and individualistic orientation.

TECHNOLOGICAL INTELLIGENCE In addition to

In these societies,
persons are well- cognitive
versed in skills of competence that is
attention, very specific to the
observation, individual, the non-
Technological intelligence is
analysis, western cultures
not so valued in many Asian
performance, speed, look for skills to
and African societies.
and achievement relate to others in the
orientation. society.
The qualities and skills regarded as
intelligent actions in non-western cultures
are sharply different, though the
boundaries are gradually vanishing under
Intelligence tests developed in the influence of western cultures.
western cultures look precisely for
these skills in an individual.

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 Intelligence in the Indian tradition
can be termed as integral
intelligence.

Views intelligence
from a holistic INTELLIGENCE IN THE
perspective where INDIAN TRADITON
equal attention is paid
to cognitive and non-
cognitive processes as
well as their
integration

The Sanskrit word ‘buddhi’

which is often used to represent
intelligence is far more
pervasive in scope than the
western concept of intelligence.
Buddhi, according to J.P. Das,
includes such skills as mental
effort, determined action,
feelings, and opinions along
with cognitive competence such
as knowledge, discrimination,
and understanding.

FACETS OF INTELLIGENCE IN THE INDIAN

TRADITION
Cognitive capacity:
sensitivity to context,
understanding,
discrimination, problem
solving, and effective
communication.
Emotional competence: self-
regulation and self-monitoring of
emotions, honesty, politeness, good Entrepreneurial
Social competence: respect conduct, and self-evaluation. competence:
for social order, commitment commitment,
to elders, the young and the persistence, patience,
needy, concern about others, hard work, vigilance,
recognising others’ and goal-directed
perspectives. behaviours.

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Programmes aimed at improving students’
emotional intelligence have beneficial effects on
their academic achievement. They encourage
cooperative behaviour and reduce their antisocial
activities. These programmes are very useful in It is receiving increasing attention of
preparing students to face the challenges of life educators for dealing with students who
outside the classroom. are affected by stresses and challenges of
the outside world.
In simpler terms it refers to
the ability to process
Emotional intelligence broadens the
emotional information
concept of intelligence beyond the
accurately and efficiently
intellectual sphere/domain.

Emotional quotient is
It considers that EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE used to express
intelligence consists
of emotions. emotional

It builds on the concept of

intelligence in the Indian
tradition. It is a set of skills that The concept was first
underlie accurate introduced by Salovey
appraisal, expression,
and Mayer. They
and regulation of
emotions. It is the considered emotional
feeling side of intelligence as ‘the
intelligence. ability to monitor one’s
own and others
emotions, to
discriminate among
them and to use the
information to guide
one’s thinking and
actions.

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Aptitude refers to special
abilities in a particular
field of activity. It is a Interest is a preference for
combination of
APTITUDE: NATURE
a particular activity;
characteristics that AND MEASUREMENT Aptitude is the potentially
indicates an individual’s to perform that activity.
capacity to acquire some
specific knowledge or
skill after training.
Psychologists have found that
people with similar
intelligence differed widely in
The knowledge of aptitude can
acquiring certain knowledge
help us to predict an
or skills. In order to be successful in a
individual’s future
particular field, a person must
performance.
have both aptitude and
intelligence.

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 They are available in two forms:
Examples of independent • Independent Aptitude Tests
aptitude tests: • Multiple Aptitude Tests Multiple aptitude tests exist
Clerical aptitude, mechanical, in the form of test batteries,
aptitude, numerical aptitude, which measure aptitude in
typing aptitude. several separate but
homogeneous areas.

APTITUDE TESTS
Examples of test batteries:
• Differential Aptitude
tests (DAT)
• General Aptitude
Tests Battery
(GATB)
• Armed Services
vocational Aptitude
Battery(ASVAB)
DAT – most commonly used in educational settings
• Consists of 8 independent subjects
1). Verbal reasoning
2). Numerical reasoning
3). Clerical speed and accuracy
4). Mechanical reasoning
5). Spatial relations
6). Abstract reasoning
7). Spelling
8). Language usage
• JM Ojha has developed the Indian adaptation of the DAT

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 CHAPTER 2
SELF AND PERSONALITY
Differentiate personal and social identity:
• Personal identity refers to those attributes of a person that make her/him different
from others.
• When a person describes herself/himself by telling her/his name (e.g., I am Sanjana
or Karim), or her/ his qualities or characteristics (e.g., I am honest or hardworking
person), or her/his potentialities or capabilities (e.g., I am a singer or dancer), or
her/his beliefs (e.g., I am a believer in God or destiny), s/he is disclosing her/his
personal identity.
• Social identity refers to those aspects of a person that link her/him to a social or
cultural
group or are derived from it.
• Ex: Hindu or a Muslim, a Brahmin or an adivasi or a North Indian or a South Indian
Self as Subject and Self as Object
• An entity that does something (e.g., I am a dancer)
• An entity on which something is done (e.g., I am one who easily gets hurt).
• In the former case, the self is described as a ‘subject’ (who does something);
• In the latter case, the self is described as an ‘object’ (which gets affected).
• When you say, “I know who I am”, the self is being described as a ‘knower’ as well
as something that can be ‘known’.
• As a subject (actor) the self actively engages in the process of knowing itself.
• As an object (consequence) the self gets observed and comes to be known.
Kinds of Self
• The first elements of self may be noticed when a newborn child cries for milk when it
is hungry.
• This biological self in the context of socio-cultural environment modifies itself.
• A distinction is made between ‘personal’ and ‘social’ self.
• The personal self leads to an orientation in which one feels primarily concerned with
oneself.
• A child’s psychological and social needs in the context of her/his environment lead
other components of personal self to emerge such as personal freedom, personal
responsibility, personal achievement, or personal comforts.
• The social self emerges in relation with others and emphasises such aspects of life as
cooperation, unity, affiliation, sacrifice, support or sharing.
• This self, values family and social relationships. Hence, it is also referred to as
familial or relational self.
COGNITIVE AND BEHAVIOURAL ASPECTS OF SELF
Self-concept:
• The way we perceive ourselves and the ideas we hold about our competencies and
attributes is also called self-concept.
• At a very general level, this view of oneself is, overall, either positive or negative.
Self-esteem:
• The value judgment of a person about herself/himself is called self-esteem.
• Some people have high self-esteem, whereas others may have low self-esteem.
• In order to assess self-esteem we present a variety of statements to a person, and ask
her/ him to indicate the extent to which those statements are true for her or him.
 • For example, we may ask a child to indicate the extent to which statements such as “I
am good at homework”, or “I am the one usually chosen for the games”, or “I am
highly liked by my peers”, are true of her/ him.
• If a child reports these statements to be true for her/him, her/his self-esteem will be
high in comparison to someone who says “no”
• Studies indicate that by the age of 6 to 7 years, children seem to have formed self-
esteem at least in four areas:
❖ Academic competence
❖ Social competence
❖ Physical/ athletic competence
❖ Physical appearance
• Self-esteem shows a strong relationship with our everyday behaviour.
• For example, children with high academic self-esteem - perform better in
• Children with high social self-esteem – liked by their peers
• Children with low self-esteem in all areas - anxiety, depression, and increasing
antisocial behaviour.
• Studies have shown that warm and positive parenting helps in the development of
high
• self-esteem among children
Self-efficacy
• A person who believes that s/he has the ability or behaviours required by a particular
situation demonstrates high self-efficacy.
• The notion of self-efficacy is based on Bandura’s social learning theory, where his
studies showed that children and adults learned behaviour by observing and imitating
others.
• A strong sense of self-efficacy allows people to select, influence, and even construct
the circumstances of their own life and they also feel less fearful.
• People with high self-efficacy have been found to stop smoking the moment they
decide
• Our society, our parents and our own positive experiences can help in the
development of a strong sense of self-efficacy by presenting positive models during
our childhood
Self-regulation
• Self-regulation refers to our ability to organise and monitor our own behaviour.
• People, who are able to change their behaviour according to the demands of the
external environment, are high on self-monitoring..
• This becomes possible through ‘will power’.
• Learning to delay or defer the gratification of needs is called self-control which plays
a key role in the fulfilment of long-term goals.
• Indian cultural tradition provides us with certain effective mechanisms (e.g., fasting in
vrata or roza and nonattachment with worldly things) for developing self-control.
Psychological techniques of self-control:
• Observation of own behaviour - provides us with necessary information that may be
used to change, modify, or strengthen certain aspects of self.
• Self-instruction - instruct ourselves to do something and behave the way we want to.
• Self-reinforcement- rewarding behaviours that have pleasant outcomes. Ex: you
may go to see a movie with friends, if you have done well in an examination.
CULTURE AND SELF

INDIAN WESTERN
Boundary is of shifting nature Boundary is fixed
Does not hold clear dichotomies Hold clear dichotomies
Self is not separated from the They maintain a distance
group
Collectivistic Individualistic
CONCEPT OF PERSONALITY
What is persona?
The literal meaning of personality is derived from the Latin word persona, the mask used by
actors in the Roman theatre for changing their facial make-up.

What is Personality?
Personality refers to our characteristic ways of responding to individuals and situations.
What are the features of Personality?
• It has both physical and psychological components.
• Its expression in terms of behaviour is fairly unique in a given individual.
• Its main features do not easily change with time.
• It is dynamic in the sense that some of its features may change due to internal or
external situational demands

MAJOR APPROACHES TO THE STUDY OF PERSONALITY

Type approaches:
• attempts to understand personality by examining certain broad patterns in the
behavioural characteristics of individuals.
Trait approaches:
• focuses on the specific psychological attributes along which individuals tend to differ
in consistent and stable ways.
• For example, one person may be less shy, whereas another may be more
• Here “shyness” represent traits with which individuals can be rated
Interactional approach:
• holds that situational characteristics play an important role in determining our
behaviour.
• People may behave as dependent or independent not because of their internal
personality trait, but because of external rewards or threats available in a particular
situation.

TYPE APPROACHES
Greek physician Hippocrates - a typology of personality based on fluid or humour.
• He classified people into four types (i.e., sanguine, phlegmatic, melancholic and
choleric);
Charak Samhita - classifies people into the categories - vata, pitta and kapha (tridosha).
Each refers to a type of temperament, called prakriti (basic nature) of a person.
• typology of personality based on the trigunas, i.e. sattva, rajas, and tamas.
• Sattva - cleanliness, truthfulness, dutifulness, detachment, discipline, etc.
• Rajas - intensive activity, desire for gratification, dissatisfaction, envy for others, and
a materialistic mentality, etc.
• Tamas - anger, arrogance, depression, laziness, feeling of helplessness, etc.
 • All the three gunas are present in each and every person in different degrees and the
dominance of one or the other guna may lead to a particular type of behaviour.
Sheldon’s typology - body build and temperament
• Endomorphs - fat, soft and round - relaxed and sociable.
• Mesomorphs - strong musculature, are rectangular with a strong body build -
energetic and courageous.
• Ectomorphs - are thin, long and fragile - they are brainy, artistic and introvert.
Jung’s typology
• Introverts - people who prefer to be alone, tend to avoid others, withdraw themselves
in the face of emotional conflicts, and are shy.
• Extraverts - are sociable, outgoing, drawn to occupations that allow dealing directly
with people, and react to stress by trying to lose themselves among people and social
activity
Friedman and Rosenman
Type-A - possess high motivation, lack patience, feel short of time, be in a great hurry, and
feel like being always burdened with work and feels difficult to relax – hypertension and
CHD
Type-B - Opposite to this is the Type-B personality, which can be understood as the absence
of Type-A traits.
Morris
Type-C - This is prone to cancer. Individuals characterized by this personality are
cooperative, unassertive and patient. They suppress their negative emotions (e.g., anger), and
show compliance to authority
Type-D - characterised by proneness to depression
Trait Approaches:
A trait is considered as a relatively enduring attribute or quality on which one individual
differs from another. They include a range of possible behaviours that are activated according
to the demands of the situation.
To summarise
• traits are relatively stable over time,
• they are generally consistent across situations
• their strengths and combinations vary across individuals leading to individual
differences in personality.
Allport’s Trait Theory
• Gordon Allport is considered the pioneer of trait approach
• He analysed the words of English language to look for traits which describe a person.
• Allport, based on this, categorised traits into cardinal, central, and secondary.
• Cardinal traits are highly generalized dispositions.
• They indicate the goal around which a person’s entire life seems to revolve. Ex:
Mahatma Gandhi’s non-violence and Hitler’s Nazism
• Such traits gets associated with the name of the person so strongly that they derive
such identities as the ‘Gandhian’ or ‘Hitlerian’ trait.
• Less pervasive in effect, but still quite generalised dispositions, are called central
traits.
• These traits (e.g., warm, sincere, diligent, etc.) are often used in writing a testimonial
or job recommendation for a person.
• The least generalized characteristics of a person are called secondary traits. Traits
such as ‘likes mangoes’ or ‘prefers ethnic clothes’ are examples of secondary traits
Cattell: Personality Factors
• He tried to identify the primary traits from a huge array of descriptive adjectives
found in language.
• He applied a statistical technique, called factor analysis, to discover the common
structures.
• He found 16 primary or source traits.
• The source traits are stable, and are considered as the building blocks of
personality.
• Besides these, there are also a number of surface traits that result out of the
interaction of source traits.
• He developed a test, called Sixteen Personality Factor Questionnaire (16PF), for
the assessment of personality
Eysenck’s Theory
H.J. Eysenck proposed that personality could be reduced into two broad dimensions. These
are biologically and genetically based. These dimensions are:
• Neuroticism vs. emotional stability :
❖ It refers to the degree to which people have control over their feelings.
❖ One extreme - people are neurotic(anxious, moody, touchy, restless )
❖ Other extreme - people are calm, even tempered, reliable and remain under
control.
• Extraversion vs. introversion :
❖ It refers to the degree to which people are socially outgoing or socially
withdrawn.
❖ One extreme - active, gregarious, impulsive and thrill seeking.
❖ Other extreme - people are passive, quiet, cautious and reserved.
• In a later work Eysenck proposed a third dimension, called
• Psychoticism [Link]
❖ A person who scores high on psychoticism dimension tends to be hostile,
egocentric, and antisocial.
❖ Eysenck Personality Questionnaire is the test which is used for studying
these dimensions of personality.
PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH
Freud used free association (a method in which a person is asked to openly share all the
thoughts, feelings and ideas that come to her/his mind), dream analysis, and analysis of
errors to understand the internal functioning of the mind.

Levels of Consciousness
• Freud’s theory visualises the human mind in terms of three levels of consciousness.
❖ Conscious - includes the thoughts, feelings and actions of which people are
aware.
❖ Preconscious - includes mental activity of which people may become aware
only if they attend to it closely.
❖ Unconscious – includes mental activity that people are unaware of.
• According to Freud, the unconscious is a reservoir of instinctive or animal drives
that are hidden from awareness because they lead to psychological conflicts.
• Most of these arise from sexual desires which cannot be expressed and is
repressed.
• Unsuccessful resolution of conflicts results in abnormal behaviour.
 • Analysis of forgetting, mispronunciations, jokes and dreams provide us with a
means to approach the unconscious.
• Freud developed a therapeutic procedure, called psychoanalysis.
• The basic goal of psychoanalytic therapy is to bring the repressed unconscious
materials to Consciousness
Structure of Personality
According to Freud’s theory, the primary structural elements of personality are three, i.e.
id, ego, and superego.
• Id :
❖ It is the source of a person’s instinctual energy – sex and aggression
❖ It deals with immediate gratification of primitive needs
❖ It works on the pleasure principle, which assumes that people seek pleasure
and try to avoid pain.
❖ Id does not care for moral values, society, or other individuals.
• Ego :
❖ It seeks to satisfy an individual’s instinctual needs in accordance with reality.
❖ It works by the reality principle, and often directs the id towards more
appropriate ways of behaving.
❖ For example, the id of a boy, who wants an ice-cream cone, tells him to
grab the cone and eat it.
❖ His ego tells him that if he grabs the cone without asking, he may be
punished.
❖ If he works on the reality principle, he will know that to achieve satisfaction
is to ask for permission to eat the cone.
• Superego : moral branch of mental functioning.
❖ The superego tells the id and the ego whether gratification is ethical.
❖ It controls the id by being a parental authority through the process of
socialisation.
❖ For example, if a boy seeks permission to buy an ice cream, superego will
indicate that his behaviour is morally correct.
• Id is energised by 2instinctual forces, called life instinct & death instinct.
• The instinctual life force that energises the id is called libido.
EGO DEFENCE MECHANISMS
• Defence mechanism is a way of reducing anxiety by distorting reality.
❖ Repression - anxiety provoking behaviours or thoughts are totally dismissed
by the unconscious.
❖ When people repress, they become unaware of that wish or desire.
❖ Ex: a person says, “I do not know why I did that”, some repressed feeling is
seen
❖ Projection – people attribute their own traits to others.
❖ Ex: a person who has strong aggressive tendencies may see other people as
acting in an excessively aggressive way towards her/him.
❖ Denial - a person totally refuses to accept reality.
❖ Ex: someone suffering from HIV/AIDS may altogether deny her/ his illness.
❖ Reaction formation - a person adopts behaviours opposite to her/his true
feelings.
❖ Ex: A person with strong sexual urges, channels her/his energy into religious
fervor
 ❖ Rationalisation - a person makes unreasonable behaviours reasonable
❖ Ex: when a student buys a set of new pens after doing poorly in examination,
s/he may rationalise behaviour by asserting,“I will do better with these pens”.
Stages of Personality Development
• Freud proposed a five-stage theory of personality (also called psychosexual)
development.
• Problems encountered at any stage may arrest development, and have long-term effect
on a person’s life.
• Oral Stage :
❖ A newborn’s instincts are focused on the mouth which is the primary pleasure
seeking centre.
❖ It is through the mouth that the baby obtains food that reduces hunger.
❖ Oral gratification is attained through feeding, thumb sucking, biting and
babbling.
❖ It is during these early months that people’s basic feelings about the world are
established.
❖ Thus, for Freud, an adult who considers the world a bitter place probably had
difficulty during the oral stage of development.
• Anal Stage :
❖ Around ages two and three the principal demands made by parents is that the
child learns to control urination and defecation
❖ children at this age experience pleasure in moving their bowels.
❖ The anal area of the body becomes the focus of pleasurable feelings.
❖ This stage establishes the basis for conflict between the id and the ego, the
desire for babyish pleasure and demand for adult, controlled behaviour.
• Phallic Stage :
❖ This stage focuses on the genitals where children begin to realise the
differences between males and females.
❖ They become aware of the sexual relationship between their parents.
❖ The male child experiences Oedipus Complex - love for the mother,
hostility towards the father, and the fear of punishment or castration by the
father
❖ Oedipus was a Greek king who unknowingly killed his father and married his
mother
❖ Developmental achievement of this stage -resolution of the Oedipus
complex by accepting his father’s relationship with his mother, and
taking father as a role model
❖ For girls, the Electra Complex after Electra, a Greek character, who
induced her brother to kill their mother)
❖ By attaching her love to father the girl tries to marry him and raise a family.
❖ When she realises that it will not happen, she begins to identify with her
mother and copy her behaviour as a means of getting her father’s affection.
❖ The critical component in resolving the Oedipus complex is boys give up
sexual feelings for their mothers and begins to see their fathers as role models
rather than as rivals; girls give up their sexual desires for their father and
identify with their mother.
• Latency stage: seven years until puberty.
❖ During this period, the sexual urges are relatively inactive.
 ❖ child’s energy is channelled into social or achievement related activities.
• Genital Stage :
❖ During this stage, the person attains maturity
❖ The sexuality, fears and repressed feelings of earlier stages repeats
❖ People learn to deal with members of the opposite sex in a matured way.
• Freud’s theory says that a child has to successfully pass through all the stages
• Failure of a child to successfully pass a stage leads to fixation to that stage.
• In this situation, the child’s development gets arrested
• For example, a child who does not pass successfully through the phallic stage may
still feel hostile toward the parent of the same sex.
• Such a boy may consider that men are generally hostile
• Regression takes a person back to an earlier stage for resolution of problems
POST-FREUDIAN APPROACHES - These theorists have been called neo-analytic or
post-Freudian in order to differentiate their work from Freud’s.
Carl Jung : Aims and Aspirations
• Jung saw human beings guided by aims and aspirations than by sex and aggression.
• He developed his own theory of personality, called analytical psychology.
• Assumption of his theory - personality consists of competing forces within the
individual (that must be balanced) rather than the individual and the demands of
society, or the individual and reality.
• Jung claimed, there is a collective unconscious-archetypes or primordial images.
• These are not individually acquired, but are inherited.
• The God or the Mother Earth is a good example of archetypes.
• They are found in myths, dreams and arts of all mankind.
• Jung held that the self, strives for unity and oneness.
• According to him, for achieving unity, a person must become aware of the wisdom in
the collective unconscious, and must learn to live in harmony with it.
Karen Horney : Optimism
• Horney emphasized on human growth and self-actualisation.
• Horney’s major contribution lies in her challenge to Freud’s treatment of women as
inferior.
• According to her, each sex has attributes to be admired and neither sex can be viewed
as superior or inferior.
• She countered that women were more likely to be affected by social and cultural
factors than by biological factors.
• She argued that psychological disorders were caused by disturbed interpersonal
relationship during childhood when parents behave indifferent, discouraging, and
erratic, the child feels insecure and a feeling develops basic anxiety
• Deep resentment or basic hostility towards parents occurs due to this anxiety.
• Parents are either dominant or indifference, or provide too much or too little
approval, which can generate feelings of isolation and helplessness which interfere
with their healthy development.
Alfred Adler: Lifestyle and Social Interest- Individual Psychology
• Assumption- human behaviour is purposeful and goal-directed.
• Our personal goals are the sources of our motivation that provide us with security and
help us in overcoming the feelings of inadequacy
 • In Adler’s view, every individual suffers from inferiority complex, which arise from
childhood.
• Overcoming this complex is essential for optimal personality development.
Erich Fromm : The Human Concerns
• Fromm developed his theory from a social orientation because of his view of humans
as social beings who could be understood in terms of their relationship with others.
• He argued that psychological qualities such as growth and realisation of potentials
resulted from a desire for freedom, and striving for justice and truth.
• Fromm holds that personality develop from our experiences with other individuals.
• While culture is shaped by a given society, people’s dominant character work as
forces in shaping the culture itself.
Erik Erikson : Search for Identity
• Erikson’s theory lays stress on rational, conscious ego processes in personality
development.
• In his theory, development is a lifelong process, with ego identity holding a central
place
• One important aspect of his theory is the concept of identity crisis of adolescents
• He argues that young people must have a direction that can give them a sense of
purpose.
Why did Psychodynamic theories face strong criticisms from many quarters?
• The theories are largely based on case studies; they lack a rigorous scientific basis.
• They use small and atypical individuals as samples for advancing generalisations.
• The concepts are not properly defined, and it is difficult to submit them to scientific
testing.
• He overlooked female experiences and perspectives by using males as the prototype
Behavioural Approach
• The behaviourists believe in data, which they feel are definable, observable, and
measurable.
• They focus on learning of stimulus-response connections and their reinforcement
• According to them, personality is a response of an individual to the environment.
• They see the development simply as a change in response characteristics
• Each response is a behaviour, which is emitted to satisfy a specific need.
• As you know, all of us eat because of hunger, but we are also very choosy about
foods.
• For example, children do not like eating many of the vegetables (e.g., spinach,
pumpkin, gourds, etc.), but gradually they learn to eat them.
Why do they do so?
• According to the behavioural approach, children may initially learn to eat such
vegetables to get appreciation (reinforcement) from their parents.
• Later on they may eventually learn to eat vegetables not only because their parents are
pleased, but also because they find the taste to be good.
• Thus, the core tendency that organises behaviour is the reduction of biological or
social needs that energise behaviour.
• This is accomplished through responses (behaviours) that are reinforced
CULTURAL APPROACH
• This approach attempts to understand the relationship between personality and
features of ecological and cultural environment.
 • The climatic conditions, the availability of food (flora and fauna) determine not only
people’s economic activities, but also their settlement patterns, social structures,
division of labour, and other features such as childrearing practices and a child’s
overall learning environment.
• People’s skill and abilities are strongly connected to these features
• Rituals, ceremonies, religious practices, arts, recreational activities, games and play
are the means through which people’s personality gets projected in a culture.
• People develop various personality (behavioural) qualities in an attempt to adapt to
the ecological and cultural features of a group’s life.
• Example: The Birhor (a tribal group) of Jharkhand live a nomadic life, which
requires constant movement in search of forest products
• In the Birhor society, children from an early age are given freedom to move into
forests and learn hunting and gathering skills there by making children independent
(do many things without help from elders), autonomous (take several decisions for
themselves), and
achievement-oriented (accept risks and challenges such as those involved in hunting)
from an early age of life.
• In agricultural societies, children are socialised to be obedient to elders, nurturant to
youngsters, and responsible to their duties.
• Since these behavioural qualities become dominant features of people’s personality
• Because of different economic pursuits and cultural demands, children in hunting
gathering and agricultural societies develop and display different personality patterns.
Humanistic Approach
• Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow have particularly contributed to the development
of humanistic perspective on personality.
• The most important idea proposed by Rogers is that of a fully functioning person.
• He believes that fulfilment is the motivating force for personality development.
• There is an inborn tendency among persons that directs them to actualise their
inherited nature.
• His theory is structured around the concept of self which assumes that people are
constantly engaged in the process of actualising their true self.
• Rogers suggests that each person also has a concept ideal self - the self that a person
would like to be.
• A person is happy when the real self and ideal self, corresponds and if there is any
discrepancy between the real self and ideal self, it results in unhappiness and
dissatisfaction.
What is Rogers basic assumptions about human behaviour?
• One is that behaviour is goal-directed and worthwhile.
• The second is that people (who are innately good) will almost always choose
adaptive, self-actualising behaviour.
What is self-actualization?
Self-actualisation is a state in which people have reached their own fullest potential.
ASSESSMENT OF PERSONALITY
What is personality assessment?
A formal effort aimed at understanding personality of an individual is termed as personality
assessment
Self-report Measures
The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) – Psychiatric diagnosis -
Hathaway and McKinley
• The test has been found very effective in identifying varieties of psychopathology.
• Its revised version is available as MMPI-2.
• 567 statements with ‘true’ or ‘false’ options – 10 subscales
Hypochondriasis, Hysteria, Paranoia, Psychopathic deviate, Psychasthenia,
Schizophrenia, Social introversion, Mania, Depression and Masculinity-femininity
Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) - Eysenck
• Initially assessed introverted-extraverted and emotionally stable-emotionally unstable.
• Later on, Eysenck added a third dimension, called psychoticism that is linked to
psychopathology that represents a lack of feeling for others, a tough manner of
interacting with people
Sixteen Personality Factor Questionnaire (16 PF - Cattell)
• The test provides with declarative statements, and the subject responds to a specific
situation by choosing from a set of given alternatives.
• The test can be used with high school level students as well as with adults.
• It has been found extremely useful in career guidance, vocational exploration, and
occupational testing.
What are the limitations of self-report measures?
• Social desirability - is a tendency on the part of the respondent to endorse items in a
socially desirable manner.
• Acquiescence - is a tendency of the subject to agree with items/questions irrespective
of their contents. It often appears in the form of saying ‘yes’ to items.
PROJECTIVE TECHNIQUES
What is the difference between direct and indirect techniques?
• Direct techniques tend to rely on information directly obtained from the person who
knows that her/his personality is being assessed so they become self-conscious and
hesitate to share their private feelings and project in a socially desirable manner.
• Direct methods of personality assessment cannot uncover the unconscious part of our
behaviour, thus failing to provide us with a real picture of an individual’s personality.
• Projective techniques (Indirect techniques) were developed to assess unconscious
motives and feelings.
• These techniques are based on the assumption that a less structured or unstructured
stimulus or situation will allow the individual to project her/his feelings, desires and
needs on to that
situation.
• A variety of projective techniques have been developed; they use various kinds of
stimulus materials and situations for assessing personality.
Features of Projective techniques:
• The stimuli are relatively or fully unstructured and poorly defined.
• The person being assessed is usually not told about the purpose of assessment and the
method of scoring and interpretation.
• The person is informed that there are no correct or incorrect responses.
• Each response is considered to reveal a significant aspect of personality.
• Scoring and interpretation are lengthy and sometimes subjective.
TYPES OF PROJECTIVE TESTS
The Rorschach Inkblot Test – Hermann Rorschach.
• 10 inkblots - Five in black and white, two with some red ink, and the remaining three
in some pastel colours - symmetrical in design with a specific shape or form.
• Each blot is printed in the centre of a white cardboard of about 7”ˆ10” size.
• The blots were originally made by dropping ink on a piece of paper and then folding
the paper in half (hence called inkblot test).
What are the 2 phases of ink blot test?
• Performance proper - the subjects are shown the cards and are asked to tell what
they see in each of them.
• Inquiry- a detailed report of the response is prepared by asking the subject to tell
where, how, and on what basis was a particular response made.
The Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) - Morgan and Murray.
• 30 black and white picture cards and one blank card. .
• Each picture is printed on a card and depicts one or more people in a variety of
situations
• Some cards are used with adults and others are used with boys or girls.
• Twenty cards are appropriate for a subject, although a lesser number of cards (even
five) have also been successfully used.
• The cards are presented one at a time and the subject is asked to tell a story describing
the situation presented in the picture:
• What led up to the situation?(past) what is happening at the moment(present),
what will
happen in the (future), and what the characters are feeling and thinking?
• Uma Chaudhury’s Indian adaptation of TAT is also available.
Rosenzweig’s Picture-Frustration Study (P-F Study) - Rosenzweig
• This test is designed to assess how people express aggression in a frustrating situation.
• The test presents with the help of cartoon like pictures in which one person frustrates
another
• The subject is asked to tell what the frustrated person will say or do.
• An attempt is made to examine whether the focus is on the frustrating object, or
on protection of the frustrated person, or on constructive solution of the
problem.
• Pareek has adapted this test for use with the Indian population
Sentence Completion Test
• This test makes use of a number of incomplete sentences.
• The starting part of the sentence is first presented and the subject has complete the
sentence.
• It is assumed that the subjects reflect their attitudes, motivation and conflicts while
completing the sentence and alsoreveal their unconscious motivations.
• Ex: My greatest fear is —————————
• The best thing about my mother is ——————————.
Draw-a-Person Test
• Here the subject is asked to draw a person on a sheet of paper.
• Then the subject is asked to draw the figure of an opposite sex person.
• Finally, the subject is asked to make a story about the person as if s/he was a character
in a novel or play.
 • Interpretations:
❖ Omission of facial features - the person tries to hide a highly conflict-ridden
interpersonal relationship
❖ Graphic emphasis on the neck - lack of control over impulses.
❖ Disproportionately large head - organic brain disease and preoccupation
with headaches.
BEHAVIOURAL ANALYSIS
Types:
Interview
• Interview involves talking to the person and asking specific questions.
• Diagnostic interviewing involves in-depth interviewing which goes beyond the
replies given by the person.
• Structured - The structured interviews address very specific questions and follow a
set procedure.
• Unstructured- the interviewer seeks to develop an impression about a person by
asking a number of questions and the way a person presents her/ himself and answers
the questions reveals her/his personality.
Observation
• Use of observation for personality assessment is a sophisticated procedure that cannot
be carried out by untrained people and require careful training of the observer.
• For example, a clinical psychologist may like to observe her/his client’s interaction
and may gain insight into the client’s personality.
What are the limitations of Observational method?
• This method is quite demanding and time-consuming.
• Maturity of the psychologist is very important for obtaining valid data
• Presence of the observer may contaminate the results.
• As a stranger, the observer may influence the behaviour of the person being observed
and thus not obtain good data.
Behavioural Ratings
• It is a frequently used method in educational and industrial settings.
• Behavioural ratings are taken from people who know the assessee and have interacted
with her/him or observed her/him.
• They put individuals into categories in terms of their behavioural qualities.
• In order to use ratings effectively, the traits should be clearly defined.
What are the limitations of behavioural ratings?
• Halo effect:
❖ Most of us are influenced by a single favourable or unfavourable trait.
❖ This often forms the basis of a rater’s overall judgment of a person.
• Middle category bias:
❖ Raters have a tendency to place individuals either in the middle of the scale by
avoiding extreme positions
• Extreme response bias:
❖ Raters have a tendency to place individuals in the extreme of the scale by
avoiding middle positions
Nomination
• In using nomination, each person is asked to choose one or more persons of the group
with whom s/he would like to work, study, play or participate in any other activity.
• The person may also be asked to specify the reason for her/his choices.
 • Nominations thus received may be analysed to understand the personality and
behavioural qualities of the person.
Situational Tests
• It provides us with information about how a person behaves under stressful situations.
• The test requires a person to perform a given task with other persons who are
instructed to be non-cooperative and interfering.
• The test involves a kind of role playing.
• A verbal report is also obtained on what s/he was asked to do.
• The situation may be realistic one, or it may be created through a video play
 CHAPTER 3
MEETING LIFE CHALLENGES
Differentiate Eustress and distress.
Eustress is the term used to describe the level of stress that is good for you and is one of a
person’s best assets for achieving peak performance and managing minor crisis. Eustress,
however, has the potential of turning into ‘distress’ which causes both physical and
psychological damage.
What is stress?
• Stress is the pattern of responses an organism makes to stimulus event that disturbs
the equilibrium and exceeds a person’s ability to cope.
• The word stress originates from the Latin words ‘strictus’, meaning tight or narrow
and ‘stringere’, the verb meaning to tighten.
• The reaction to external stressors is called ‘strain’
Cognitive theory of stress - Lazarus
The perception of stress is dependent upon the individual’s cognitive appraisal of events
and the resources available to deal with them – Discuss
• Lazarus has distinguished between two types of appraisal, i.e. primary and
secondary.
• Primary appraisal refers to the perception of a new or changing environment as
positive, neutral or negative
• Negative events are appraised for their possible harm, threat or challenge.
• Harm is the assessment of the damage that has already been done by an event.
• Threat is the assessment of possible future damage that may be brought about by the
event.
• A challenge appraisal is the expectations of the ability to cope with the stressful
event.
Secondary appraisal –
• assessment of one’s coping abilities and resources
• These resources may be mental, physical, personal or social.
• If one has a positive attitude, health, skills and social support to deal with the crises
s/he will feel less stressed.
• These appraisals are very subjective and will depend on many factors.
❖ Past experience - If one has handled similar situations very successfully in the
past, they would be less threatening for her/him.
❖ Controllability - A person who believes that s/he can control a negative
situation will experience less amount of stress than those who have no such
sense of personal control.
Reaction to stress:
Physiological reaction:
• The hypothalamus initiates action along two pathways.
• First, in the autonomic nervous system, the adrenal gland releases large amount of
catecholamines (epinephrine and norepinephrine) into the blood stream.
• This leads to fight-or-flight response.
• Second - the pituitary gland, secretes the corticosteroid (cortisol) which provides
energy.
Emotional reactions
• negative emotions such as fear, anxiety, embarrassment, anger, depression or even
denial.
Behavioural reactions – fight or flight
Cognitive reactions - include responses such as inability to concentrate, and intrusive,
repetitive thoughts.
How does stress vary from one person to another?
• intensity (low intensity vs. high intensity),
• duration (short-term vs. long term),
• complexity ( less complex vs. more complex) and
• predictability (unexpected vs. predictable).
• Usually more intense, prolonged or chronic, complex and unanticipated stresses
have more negative consequences than less intense, short-term, less complex and
expected stresses.
• Physiological strength - individuals with poor physical health and weak constitution
would be more vulnerable than would be those who enjoy good health and strong
constitution.
• Psychological characteristics - mental health, temperament, and selfconcept are
relevant to the experience of stress.
• Stress experience will be determined by the resources of the person, such as money,
social skills, coping style, support networks, etc
TYPES OF STRESS
Physical and Environmental Stress
• Physical stresses are demands that change the state of our body.
• We feel strained when we overexert ourselves physically, lack a nutritious diet, suffer
an injury, or fail to get enough sleep.
Environmental stresses
• Aspects of our surroundings those are often unavoidable such as air pollution,
crowding, noise, heat of the summer, winter cold, etc.
• Another group of environmental stresses are catastrophic events or disasters such as
fire, earthquake, floods, etc.
Psychological stress
• Frustration - results from the blocking of needs and motives by something or
someone that hinders us from achieving a desired goal. Ex: social discrimination,
interpersonal hurt, low grades in school, etc.
• Conflicts – confusion between two or more incompatible needs or motives, e.g.
whether to study dance or psychology.
• Internal pressures - stem from beliefs based upon expectations from inside us to
ourselves such as, ‘I must do everything perfectly’.
• Social pressures – comes from people who make excessive demands on us which can
cause even greater pressure when we have to work with them
Social Stress
• Result from our interaction with other people
• Social events like death or illness in the family, strained relationships, trouble with
neighbours are some examples of social stresses.
• It varies from person to person. Ex: Attending parties may be stressful for a person
who likes to spend quiet evenings at home while an outgoing person may find staying
at home in the evenings stressful.
Sources of stress
Life Events
• Changes, both big and small, sudden and gradual affect our life
• We can cope with small, everyday changes but major life events can be stressful,
because they disturb our routine
 • If these life events that are planned (e.g. moving into a new house) or unpredicted
(e.g. break-up of a long-term relationship) occur within a short period of time, we find
it difficult to cope with them
Hassles
• The happenings in our daily life, such as noisy surroundings, commuting, quarrelsome
neighbours, electricity and water shortage are examples of daily hassles.
• Attending to various emergencies are daily hassles experienced by a housewife.
• These daily hassles may sometimes have devastating consequences for the individual
who is often the one coping alone with them
• These hassles results in stress, thereby reduce a person’s psychological well-being.
Traumatic Events
• Events such as a fire, train or road accident, robbery, earthquake, tsunami, etc are
examples of traumatic events
• The effects of these events may occur after some time and the person might
experience symptoms of anxiety, flashbacks, dreams and disturbing thoughts, etc.
• Professional help will be needed to cope with them especially if they persist for many
months
EFFECTS OF STRESS ON PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTIONING AND HEALTH
Emotional Effects:
• People with stress are likely to experience mood swings, and show aggressive
behaviour that may alienate them from family and friends.
• In some cases this can start a vicious circle of decreasing confidence, leading to more
serious emotional problems.
• Some examples are feelings of anxiety and depression, increased physical tension,
increased psychological tension and mood swings.
Physiological Effects :
• When the human body is placed under stress, it increases the production of certain
hormones, such as adrenaline and cortisol that produce changes in heart rate, blood
pressure levels, metabolism and physical activity.
• Although, this physical reaction will help us to function more effectively, it can be
extremely damaging to the body in the long-term effects.
• Examples of physiological effects are release of epinephrine and norepinephrine,
slowing down of the digestive system, expansion of air passages in the lungs,
increased heart rate, and
constriction of blood vessels.
Cognitive Effects :
• Too much of stress leads to mental overload and cause individuals to lose their ability
to make sound decisions.
• Faulty decisions made at home, in career, or at workplace may lead to arguments,
failure, financial loss or even loss of job.
• Cognitive effects of stress are poor concentration, and reduced short-term memory
capacity.
Behavioural Effects:
• Stress affects our behaviour in the form of eating less nutritional food, increasing
intake of stimulants such as caffeine, excessive consumption of cigarettes, alcohol and
other drugs such as tranquillisers etc.
• Tranquillisers can be addictive and have side effects such as loss of concentration,
poor coordination, and dizziness.
 • Some of the typical behavioural effects of stress seen are disrupted sleep patterns,
increased absenteeism, and reduced work performance.
Stress and Health
• People who are unhappy in their personal lives fall sick more often than those who are
happy
• People with chronic daily stress do not care for herself or himself.
• When stress is prolonged, it affects physical health and impairs psychological
functioning.
• People get exhausted when stress from the environment is too high and little support
is available from family and friends.
• Physical exhaustion – chronic fatigue, weakness and low energy.
• Mental exhaustion - irritability, anxiety, feelings of helplessness and hopelessness.
• The state of physical, emotional and psychological exhaustion is known as burnout.
• Stress can produce changes in the immune system and increase the chances of
becoming ill. Stress leads to development of cardiovascular disorders, high blood
pressure, as well as psychosomatic disorders including ulcers, asthma, allergies and
headaches
GENERAL ADAPTATION SYNDROME - Selye
What happens to the body when stress is prolonged?
• Selye exposed animals to a variety of stressors such as high temperature, X-rays and
insulin injections, in the laboratory and also observed patients with various injuries
and illnesses
in hospitals.
• Selye noticed a similar pattern of bodily response in all of them which he called the
General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS).
• GAS involves three stages:
• Alarm reaction stage :
❖ The presence of stressor leads to activation of the adrenal pituitary-cortex
system.
❖ This releases hormones producing stress response that prepares the individual
for fight or flight.
• Resistance stage :
❖ If stress is prolonged, the resistance stage begins.
❖ The parasympathetic nervous system makes use of the body’s resources.
❖ The organism makes efforts to cope with the threat

• Exhaustion stage :
❖ Continued exposure to the same stressor drains the body’s resources and leads
to the exhaustion.
❖ The physiological systems involved in alarm reaction and resistance become
ineffective and the person develops stress-related diseases such as high blood
pressure
Why was Selye’s model criticized?
• Selye’s model has been criticised for assigning a very limited role to psychological
factors in stress.
• Researchers have reported that the psychological appraisal of events is important for
the
determination of stress.
 • How people respond to stress is substantially influenced by their perceptions,
personalities and biological constitutions.
Stress and the Immune System
What is Psychoneuroimmunology?
• Psychoneuroimmunology focuses on the links between the mind, the brain and the
immune system.
• It studies the effects of stress on the immune system.
How does the immune system work?
• The white blood cells (leucocytes), within the immune system, identify and destroy
the foreign bodies (antigens) such as viruses and also produce antibodies.
• The different kinds of white blood cells or leucocytes are T cells, B cells and natural
killer cells.
• T cells destroy invaders, and T-helper cells increase immunological activity.
• It is these T-helper cells that are attacked by the Human Immuno Deficiency Virus
(HIV), the virus causing Acquired Immuno Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS).
• B cells produce antibodies and natural killer cells are involved in the fight against
both viruses and tumours.
How can stress affect natural killer cell cytotoxicity?
• Natural killer cell cytotoxicity, plays a major role in the defence against various
infections and cancer.
• Reduced levels of natural killer cell cytotoxicity have been found in people who are
highly stressed, including students facing important examinations, bereaved persons,
and those who are severely depressed
How can negative emotions affect the immune system?
• Psychological stress is accompanied by negative emotions
• The incidence of psychological disorders, such as panic attacks and obsessive
behaviour increases with the build-up of long-term stress.
• People under prolonged stress are more prone to irrational fears, mood swings and
phobias, and may experience fits of depression, anger and irritability.
• These negative emotions appear to be related to the function of the immune system
• Negative moods have been associated with poorer health outcomes.
• Feelings of hopelessness are related to worsening of disease, increased risk of injury
and death due to various causes.

Lifestyle
• Lifestyle is the overall pattern of decisions and behaviours that determine a person’s
health and quality of life.
• Stressed individuals expose themselves to pathogens, which are agents causing
physical illness.
• People who are stressed have poor nutritional habits, sleep less and are likely to
engage in other health risking behaviours like smoking and alcohol abuse.
• Though these behaviours are temporarily rewarding, they have long-term negative
effects
• Promoting behaviour like balanced diet, regular exercise, family support, etc. play an
important role in good health.
• Practicing a lifestyle that includes balanced low fat diet, regular exercise and
continued activity along with positive thinking enhances health and longevity.
COPING WITH STRESS
Coping is a dynamic situation-specific reaction to stress.
The three coping strategies given by Endler and Parker are:
• Task-oriented Strategy :
❖ This involves obtaining information about the stressful situation, its alternative
courses of action and the outcome
❖ It also decides on priorities and acting so as to deal directly with the stress
❖ For example, schedule my time better, or think about how I have solved
similar problems.
• Emotion-oriented Strategy :
❖ This involves efforts to control one’s emotions by either venting feelings of
anger and frustration, or deciding that nothing can be done to change things.
❖ For example, tell myself that it is not really happening to me, or worry about
what I am going to do.
• Avoidance-oriented Strategy :
❖ This involves minimising the seriousness of the situation by conscious
suppression of stressful thoughts and their replacement by self-protective
thoughts.
❖ Example: watching TV, phone up a friend, or try to be with other people.
According to Lazarus and Folkman coping responses can be divided into two types:
• Problem-focused strategies attack the problem itself, with behaviours designed to
gain information, to alter the event, belief and commitments.
• They increase the person’s awareness, level of knowledge, and range of behavioural
and cognitive coping options.
• For example “I made a plan of action and followed it”.
• Emotion-focused strategies call for psychological changes designed primarily to limit
the degree of emotional disruption caused by an event, with minimal effort to alter the
event .
• For example “I did some things to let it out of my system”.
Stress Management Techniques
Relaxation Techniques :
• Relaxation starts from the lower part of the body and progresses up to the facial
muscles in such a way that the whole body is relaxed.
• Deep breathing is used along with muscle relaxation to calm the mind and relax the
body.
Meditation Procedures :
• The yogic method of meditation consists of a sequence of learned techniques for
refocusing of attention that brings about an altered state of consciousness.
• It involves such a thorough concentration that the meditator becomes unaware of any
outside stimulation and reaches a different state of consciousness.
Biofeedback :
• It is a procedure to monitor and reduce the physiological aspects of stress by
providing feedback about current physiological activity and is often accompanied by
relaxation training.
• Biofeedback training involves three stages :
❖ developing an awareness of the particular physiological response, e.g. heart
rate,
❖ learning ways of controlling that response in quiet conditions;
❖ Transferring that learning of control to everyday life.
Creative Visualisation :
• Creative visualisation is a subjective experience that uses imagery and imagination.
• Before visualising one must set oneself a realistic goal, as it helps build confidence.
 • It is easier to visualise if one’s mind is quiet and eyes are closed because it reduces
the interference of negative thoughts and gives energy to turn out the imagination to
reality.
Cognitive Behavioural Techniques :
• Stress inoculation training is one effective method developed by Meichenbaum.
• The essence of this approach is to replace negative and irrational thoughts with
positive ones.
• There are three main phases in this :
❖ Assessment - involves discussing the nature of the problem and seeing it from
the client’s point of view.
❖ Stress reduction - involves learning the techniques of reducing stress such as
relaxation and self-instruction.
❖ Follow through – to check whether the techniques have worked well
Exercise:
• Regular exercise improves the efficiency of the heart, enhances the function of the
lungs, maintains good circulation, lowers blood pressure, reduces fat in the blood and
improves the body’s immune system.
• Swimming, walking, running, cycling, skipping, etc. help to reduce stress.
• One must practice these exercises at least four times a week for 30 minutes at a time.
PROMOTING POSITIVE HEALTH AND WELL-BEING
Stress Resistant Personality : Kobasa
• People with high levels of stress but low levels of illness share three
characteristics, which are referred to as the personality traits of hardiness.
• It consists of ‘the three Cs’, i.e. commitment, control, and challenge.
• Hardiness is a set of beliefs about oneself, the world, and how they interact.
• People with SRP have personal commitment to what you are doing, a sense of
control over your life, and a feeling of challenge.
• Stress resistant personalities have control which is a sense of purpose and direction
in life; commitment to work, family, hobbies and social life; and challenge, that
is, they see changes in life as normal and positive rather than as a threat.
Life Skills
Life skills are abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour that enable individuals to
deal effectively with the demands and challenges of everyday life
Assertiveness :
• Assertiveness is a behaviour or skill that helps to communicate, clearly and
confidently, our feelings, needs, wants, and thoughts.
• It is the ability to say no to a request, to state an opinion without being self-
conscious, or to express emotions such as love, anger, etc. openly.
Time Management :
• Learning how to plan time and delegate can help to relieve the pressure.
• The central principle of time management is to spend your time doing the things that
you value, or that help you to achieve your goals.
• It depends on being realistic about what you know and doing it within time period and
knowing what you want to do, and organising your life according to that.
Rational Thinking :
• Many stress-related problems occur because of faulty thinking.
• When we are stressed, we attend to negative thoughts and images from the past,
which affect our perception of the present and the future.
 • Some of the ways to develop positive thinking are challenging your irrational beliefs,
driving out negative anxiety-provoking thoughts, and making positive statements.
Improving Relationships :
• The key to a sound lasting relationship is communication.
• This consists of three essential skills:
❖ listening to what the other person is saying,
❖ expressing how you feel and what you think, and
❖ accepting the other person’s opinions and feelings, even if they are different
from your own
Self-care :
• If we keep ourselves healthy, we will be able to tackle the stresses of everyday life.
• Our breathing patterns reflect our state of mind andemotions.
• When we are stressed or anxious, we may have rapid breathing
• The most relaxed breathing is slow, stomach-centred breathing from the diaphragm,
i.e. a dome like muscle between the chest and the abdominal cavity.
• Environmental stresses like noise, pollution etc. can influence on mood and may
affect our ability to cope with stress, and well-being.
Overcoming Unhelpful Habits :
• Perfectionists are persons who have difficulty in factors such as time available,
consequences of not being able to stop work, and the effort needed.
• They are more likely to feel tense and find it difficult to relax, are critical of self and
others, and may become inclined to avoid challenges.
• Avoidance is to put the issue under the carpet and refuse to accept or face it.
• Procrastination means putting off what we know we need to do.
• People who procrastinate are deliberately avoiding confronting their fears of failure or
rejection.
Promoting positive health:
• Health is a state of complete physical, mental, social and spiritual well-being, and
not merely the absence of disease or infirmity
What are the factors that act as stress buffers and facilitate positive health?
Diet :
• A balanced diet strengthen the immune system and make one feel better to cope with
stress
• The key to healthy living is to eat a varied well-balanced diet.
• How much nutrition one needs depends on one’s activity level, genetic make-up,
climate, and health history.
• What people eat, and how much do they weigh involve behavioural processes.
• When we are stressed, we seek ‘comfort foods’ which are high in fats, salt and sugar.
Exercise :
• Regular exercise plays an important role in managing weight and stress, and is shown
to have a positive effect on reducing tension, anxiety and depression.
• stretching exercises such as yogic asanas gives a calming effect and aerobic exercises
such as jogging, swimming, cycling, etc increase the arousal level of the body
• fitness permits individuals to maintain general mental and physical wellbeing even in
the face of negative life events.
Positive Attitude :
• Some of the factors leading to a positive attitude are:
❖ having a fairly accurate perception of reality;
❖ a sense of purpose in life and responsibility;
 ❖ acceptance and tolerance for different viewpoints of others;
❖ and taking credit for success and accepting blame for failure.
❖ Finally, being open to new ideas and having a sense of humour with the ability
to laugh at oneself help us to remain centered, and see things in a proper
perspective.
Positive Thinking :
• Optimism has always been linked to psychological and physical wellbeing.
• Optimists tend to assume that problems can be handled successfully whereas
pessimists expect disasters.
• Optimists use more problem-focused coping strategies, and seek advice and help from
others.
• Pessimists ignore the problem and use strategies such as giving up the goal or deny
that the stress exists
Social Support :
Social support is defined as the existence and availability of people on whom we can rely
upon, people who let us know that they care about, value, and love us.
Perceived support, - the quality of social support is positively related to health and
wellbeing, Social network, - the quantity of social support is unrelated to well-being
What are the types of social support?
• Tangible support - assistance involving material aid, such as money, goods, services,
etc.
For example, a child gives notes to her/his friend, since s/he was absent from school
due to sickness.
• Family and friends also provide informational support about stressful events. For
example, a student facing a board examination, if provided information by a friend
who has faced a similar one, will help him identify the exact procedures and also
about resources and coping strategies to pass the exam.
• Supportive friends and family provide emotional support by reassuring the
individual that she/he is loved, valued, and cared for.
 CHAPTER 4
PSYCHOLOGICAL DISORDERS
CONCEPTS OF ABNORMALITY AND PSYCHOLOGICAL DISORDERS
Most definitions have certain common features, often called the ‘four Ds’:
Deviance: different, extreme, unusual, even bizarre
Distress: unpleasant and upsetting to the person and to others
Dysfunction: interfering with the person’s ability to carry out daily activities in a
constructive way
Dangerous: to the person or to others
What is the difference between normal and abnormal?
Various approaches have been used in distinguishing between normal and abnormal
behaviours. From these approaches, there emerge two basic and conflicting views:
The first approach views abnormal behaviour as a deviation from social norms. Many
• Each society has norms for proper behaviour and people who have behaviours,
thoughts and emotions that break societal norms are called abnormal.
• A society’s norms grow from its culture — its history, values, institutions and habits
• Thus, a society whose culture values competition may accept aggressive behaviour,
whereas one that emphasizes co-operation and family values may consider
aggressiveness as abnormal
• A society’s values may change over time, causing changes in the view of abnormality
• The second approach views abnormal behaviour as maladaptive.
• The best criterion for determining the normality of behaviour is not whether society
accepts it but whether it fosters the well-being of the individual
• Well-being is not simply maintenance and survival but also includes growth and
fulfilment, i.e. the actualisation of potential
• According to this criterion, behaviour can be seen as abnormal, if it interferes with
optimal functioning and growth.
• For example, a student in the class prefers to remain silent even when s/he has
questions in her/his mind.
Historical Background
Ancient theory:
• People believed that there is the operation of supernatural and magical forces such as
evil spirits (bhoot-pret), or the devil (shaitan).
• Exorcism - removing the evil that resides in the individual through countermagic and
prayer, is still commonly used.
• The shaman, or medicine man (ojha) is a person who is believed to have contact
with supernatural forces and is the medium through which spirits communicate with
human beings.
• Through the shaman, an affected person can learn which spirits are responsible for
her/his problems and what needs to be done to please them.
Biological/organic approach:
• Individuals behave strangely because their bodies and their brains are not working
properly.
• In the modern era, there is evidence that body and brain processes have been linked to
many types of maladaptive behaviour.
 • For certain types of disorders, if we correct these defective biological processes, it
results in improved functioning.
Psychological approach:
• Psychological problems are caused by inadequacies in the way an individual thinks,
feels, or perceives the world.
Organismic approach:
• Philosopher physicians of ancient Greece such as Hippocrates, Socrates, and in
particular
Plato viewed disturbed behaviour as arising out of conflicts between emotion and
reason.
• Galen elaborated on the role of the four humours
• According to him, the world was made up of four elements, viz. earth, air, fire, and
water which combined to form four body fluids, viz. blood, black bile, yellow bile,
and phlegm.
• Each of these fluids was seen to be responsible for a different temperament.
• Imbalances among the humours were believed to cause various disorders.
Middle Ages:
• Demonology and superstition gained importance in explaining abnormality
• Demonology related to a belief that people with mental problems were evil and there
were instances of ‘witch-hunts’ during this period.
• During the early Middle Ages, the Christian spirit of charity prevailed and St.
Augustine wrote extensively about feelings, mental anguish and conflict.
The Renaissance Period
• This period was marked by increased humanism and curiosity about behaviour.
• Johann Weyer emphasised psychological conflict and disturbed interpersonal
relationships as causes of psychological disorders.
• He also insisted that ‘witches’ required medical, not theological, treatment.
The seventeenth and eighteenth - Age of Reason and Enlightenment
• Scientific method replaced faith and dogma as ways of understanding abnormal
behaviour.
• Scientific attitude towards psychological disorders contributed to the Reform
Movement
• It increased compassion for people who suffered from these disorders.
• Reforms of asylums were initiated in both Europe and America.
• One aspect of the reform movement was deinstitutionalization which provided
community care for recovered mentally ill individuals.
Innteractional approach / Biopsycho-social approach:
• From this perspective, all three factors, i.e. biological, psychological and social play
important roles in influencing the expression and outcome of psychological disorders.
CLASSIFICATION OF PSYCHOLOGICAL DISORDERS
Why do think there is a need to classify psychological disorders?
• A classification of disorders consists of a list of categories of specific psychological
disorders grouped into various classes on the basis of some coomon characteristics.
• It enable users like psychologists, psychiatrists and social workers to communicate
with each other about the disorder
 • It helps in understanding the causes of psychological disorders and the processes
involved in their development and maintenance.\
• The American Psychiatric Association (APA) has published an official manual
describing and classifying various kinds of psychological disorders.
• The current version of it, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders,5th Edition (DSM-5)
• The classification scheme officially used in India and elsewhere is the tenth
revision of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10)
• It was prepared by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
FACTORS UNDERLYING ABNORMAL BEHAVIOUR
• Biological factors influence all aspects of our behaviour.
• According to the biological model, abnormal behaviour has a biochemical or
physiological basis.
• Psychological disorders are often related to problems in the transmission of messages
from one neuron to another.
• When an electrical impulse reaches a neuron’s ending, the nerve ending is stimulated
to release a chemical, called a neuro-transmitter.
• Studies indicate that abnormal activity by certain neuro-transmitters can lead to
specific psychological disorders.
❖ Anxiety disorders - low activity gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA)
❖ Schizophrenia - excess activity of dopamine
❖ depression - low activity of serotonin.
Genetic factors
• have been linked to bipolar and related disorders, schizophrenia, intellectual disability
and other psychological disorders.
• Researchers have not, however, been able to identify the specific genes that are the
culprits.
• It appears that in most cases, no single gene is responsible for psychological disorder
• many genes combine to help bring about our various behaviours and
emotional reactions, both functional and dysfunctional.
Psychological models
• Psychological and interpersonal factors have a significant role to play in abnormal
behaviour.
• These factors include
❖ Maternal deprivation (separation from the mother, or lack of warmth and
stimulation during early years of life),
❖ faulty parent-child relationships (rejection, overprotection, over-
permissiveness, faulty discipline, etc.),
❖ maladaptive family structures (inadequate or disturbed family), and
❖ severe stress.
• The psychological models include the psychodynamic, behavioural, cognitive,
and humanistic-existential models.
Psychodynamic model
• oldest and most famous of the modern psychological models.
• Behaviour is determined by psychological forces within the person
 • Abnormal symptoms are viewed as the result of conflicts between these forces.
• This model was first formulated by Freud who believed that three central forces shape
personality – id, ego and superego
• Freud stated that abnormal behaviour is due to conflicts that can be generally traced to
early childhood or infancy.
Behavioural model.
• This model states that psychological disorders are the result of learning maladaptive
ways of behaving.
• The model concentrates on behaviours that are learned through conditioning and
proposes
that what has been learned can be unlearned.
• Learning can take place by classical conditioning - two events repeatedly occur close
together in time, operant conditioning - behaviour is followed by a reward and social
learning- learning by imitating others
Cognitive model.
• This model states that abnormal functioning can result from cognitive problems.
• People may hold assumptions and attitudes about themselves that are irrational and
inaccurate, think in illogical ways and make overgeneralizations
Humanistic-existential model
• Humanists believe that human beings are born with a natural tendency to be friendly,
cooperative and constructive, and are driven to self-actualise, i.e. to fulfill this
potential for goodness and growth.
• Existentialists believe that we have freedom to give meaning to our existence or to
avoid that responsibility.
• Those who shirk from this responsibility would live empty, inauthentic, and
dysfunctional lives.
Socio-cultural factors:
• As behaviour is shaped by societal forces, factors such as family structure and
communication, social networks, societal conditions, and societal labels and roles
become more important.
• Some families have an enmeshed structure in which the members are overinvolved in
each other’s activities, thoughts, and feelings.
• Children from this kind of family may have difficulty in becoming independent in
life.
• The broader social networks in which people operate include their social and
professional relationships.
• Studies have shown that people who are isolated and lack social support, are likely
to become more depressed than those who have good friendships.
• When people break norms of their society, they are called deviant and ‘mentally ill’.
Diathesis-stress model.
• This model states that psychological disorders develop when a diathesis (biological
predisposition to the disorder) is set off by a stressful situation.
• This model has three components:
❖ First is the diathesis - presence of some biological aberration which may be
inherited.
 ❖ The second component is that the person is vulnerable to develop a disorder.
❖ This means that the person is ‘at risk’ or ‘predisposed’ to develop the disorder.
❖ The third component is the presence of pathogenic stressors, i.e. factors/
stressors that may lead to psychopathology.
MAJOR PSYCHOLOGICAL DISORDERS
Anxiety Disorders
• Anxiety disorder — the most common category of psychological disorders.
Definition: diffuse, vague, very unpleasant feeling of fear and apprehension.
Symptoms: rapid heart rate, shortness of breath, diarrhoea, loss of appetite, fainting,
dizziness, sweating, sleeplessness, frequent urination and tremors.
Types:
Generalised anxiety disorder: prolonged, vague, unexplained and intense fears that are not
attached to any particular object.
Symptoms: worry and apprehensive feelings about the future; hypervigilance, which
involves constantly scanning the environment for dangers, motor tension, as a result of which
the person is unable to relax, is restless.
Panic disorder:
• Recurrent anxiety attacks in which the person experiences intense terror,
• Anxiety rising to a peak when thoughts of a particular stimuli are present that occur in
an unpredictable manner.
• Symptoms: shortness of breath, dizziness, trembling, palpitations, choking, nausea,
chest pain or discomfort, fear of going crazy, losing control or dying.
Phobias :
• irrational fears related to specific objects, people, or situations.
• Phobias often develop with a generalised anxiety disorder.
• Types
❖ Specific phobias: This group includes irrational fears such as intense fear of a
certain type of animal, or of being in an enclosed space.
❖ Social phobias: Intense and incapacitating fear and embarrassment when
dealing with others characterizes social anxiety disorder (social phobia).
❖ Agoraphobia: fear of entering unfamiliar situations where many people are
afraid of leaving their home and their ability to carry out normal life activities
is severely limited.
Separation anxiety disorder (SAD)
• Fearful and anxious about separation from attachment figures that is developmentally
not appropriate.
• Children with SAD may have difficulty being in a room by themselves, going to
school alone, are fearful of entering new situations, and cling to and shadow their
parents’ every move.
• To avoid separation, children with SAD may fuss, scream, throw severe tantrums, or
make suicidal gestures.
Obsessive-Compulsive and Related Disorders
OCD: unable to control their preoccupation with specific ideas or are unable to prevent
themselves from repeatedly carrying out a particular act or series of acts that affect their
ability to carry out normal activities.
Obsessive behaviour: inability to stop thinking about a particular idea or topic.
Compulsive behaviour: the need to perform certain behaviours over and over again.
Example: counting, ordering, checking, touching and washing.
Other disorders in this category: hoarding disorders, excoriation, trichotillomania
Trauma- and Stressor-Related Disorders
• Very often people who have been caught in a natural disaster or have been victims of
bomb blasts by terrorists, or been in a serious accident or in a war-related situation,
experience post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
• Symptoms: recurrent dreams, flashbacks, impaired concentration, and emotional
numbing
• Other disorders in this category: Adjustment Disorders and Acute Stress
Disorder
SOMATIC SYMPTOM AND RELATED DISORDERS:
Somatic symptom disorder
• a person having persistent body-related symptoms which may or may not be related
to serious medical condition.
• People with this disorder are overly preoccupied with their symptoms and they
continually worry about their health and make frequent visits to doctors.
• As a result, they experience significant distress and disturbances in their daily life.
Illness anxiety disorder
• Preoccupation about developing a serious illness and worrying about this possibility.
• This is accompanied by anxiety about one’s health.
• overly concerned about undiagnosed disease, negative diagnostic results,
• do not respond to assurance by doctors,
• Easily alarmed about illness such as on hearing about someone else's ill-health or such
news.
What is the difference between somatic symptom disorder and illness anxiety disorder?
• Both somatic symptom disorder and illness anxiety disorder are concerned with
medical illnesses.
• The difference lies in the way this concern is expressed.
• Somatic symptom disorder - expression is in terms of physical complaints
• Illness anxiety disorder - it is the anxiety which is the main concern
Conversion disorders
• reported loss of part or all of some basic body functions.
• Ex: Paralysis, blindness, deafness and difficulty in walking
• These symptoms often occur after a stressful experience and may be quite sudden.
Dissociative Disorders
Dissociation – severance of the connections between ideas and emotions.
Dissociation - feelings of unreality, estrangement, depersonalisation, and sometimes loss or
shift of identity and sudden alterations of consciousness that blot out painful experiences
• Dissociative Amnesia:
❖ extensive but selective memory loss that has no known organic cause (e.g.,
head injury).
❖ Some people cannot remember anything about their past.
 ❖ Others can no longer recall specific events, people, places, or objects, while
their memory for other events remains intact.
❖ A part of dissociative amnesia is dissociative fugue – unexpected travel away
from home and workplace, the assumption of a new identity, and the inability
to recall the previous identity.
❖ The fugue usually ends when the person suddenly ‘wakes up’ with no memory
of the events that occurred during the fugue.
• Dissociative identity disorder - multiple personality
❖ often associated with traumatic experiences in childhood.
❖ In this disorder, the person assumes alternate personalities that may or may not
be aware of each other.
• Depersonalisation/Derealisation
❖ disorder involves a dreamlike state in which the person has a sense of being
separated both from self and from reality.
❖ there is a change of self-perception, and the person’s sense of reality is
temporarily lost or changed.
Depressive Disorders
• Major depressive disorder - a period of depressed mood and/or loss of interest or
pleasure in most activities, together with other symptoms which may include change
in body weight, constant sleep problems, tiredness, inability to think clearly, agitation,
greatly slowed behaviour, and thoughts of death and suicide.
• Other symptoms include excessive guilt or feelings of worthlessness.
Factors Predisposing towards Depression :
• Genetic make-up, or heredity
• Age - women are particularly at risk during young adulthood, while for men the risk is
highest in early middle age.
• Gender - women in comparison to men are more likely to report a depressive
disorder.
• Other risk factors - experiencing negative life events and lack of social support.
Bipolar and Related Disorders
• Involves both mania and depression, which are alternately present and sometimes
interrupted by periods of normal mood.
• Manic episodes rarely appear by themselves; they usually alternate with depression.
• Bipolar mood disorders were earlier referred to as manic-depressive disorders.
• Some examples of types of bipolar and related disorders include Bipolar I Disorder,
Bipolar II disorder and Cyclothymic Disorder.
Suicide
• Suicide is a result of complex interface of biological, genetic, psychological,
sociological, cultural and environmental factors.
• Some other risk factors - having mental disorders (especially depression and alcohol
use disorders), going through natural disasters, experiencing violence, abuse or loss
and isolation at any stage and previous suicidal attempts is the greatest risk factor
Why people commit suicide?
• Suicidal behavior indicates difficulties in problem-solving, stress management, and
emotional expression
 • Suicidal thoughts lead to suicidal action only when acting on these thoughts seems to
be the only way out of a person’s difficulties.
• These thoughts are heightened under acute emotional and other distress.
How can we prevent suicide?
• There is a need for comprehensive multi-sectoral approach where the government,
media and civil society all play important role as stakeholders.
Some measures suggested by WHO include:
• limiting access to the means of suicide;
• reporting of suicide by media in a responsible way;
• bringing in alcohol-related policies;
• early identification, treatment and care of people at risk;
• training health workers in assessing and managing for suicide;
• care for people who attempted suicide and providing community support.
How can we identify students in distress?
Any change in behaviour should be taken seriously, such as:
• lack of interest in common activities
• declining grades
• decreasing effort
• misbehavior in the classroom
• mysterious or repeated absence
• smoking or drinking, or drug misuse
How can we strengthen students’ self-esteem?
The following approaches can be useful:
• accentuating positive life experiences, develop positive identity which increases self
confidence
• providing opportunities for development of physical, social and vocational skills.
• establishing a trustful communication.
• goals for the students should be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, to be completed
within a relevant time frame.

SCHIZOPHRENIA SPECTRUM AND OTHER PSYCHOTIC DISORDERS

• Schizophrenia is a debilitating disorder.
• The social and psychological costs of schizophrenia are tremendous, both to patients
as well as to their families and society.
SYMPTOMS OF SCHIZOPHRENIA
POSITIVE SYMPTOMS (i.e. excesses of thought, emotion, and behaviour): Positive
symptoms are ‘pathological excesses’ or ‘bizarre additions’ to a person’s behaviour.
Delusions – false belief that is firmly held on inadequate grounds.
• Types:
❖ Delusions of persecution - believe that they are being plotted against, spied
on, slandered, threatened, attacked or deliberately victimised.
❖ Delusions of reference - attach special and personal meaning to the actions of
others or to objects and events.
❖ Delusions of grandeur - people believe themselves to be specially
empowered persons
 ❖ Delusions of control – they believe that their feelings, thoughts and actions
are controlled by others.
Formal thought disorders - can make communication extremely difficult.
❖ Loosening of associations – derailment – rapidly shifting from one topic to another
so that the normal structure of thinking is muddled and becomes illogical
❖ Neologism: inventing new words or phrases
❖ Perseveration: persistent and inappropriate repetition of the same thoughts
Hallucinations - perceptions that occur in the absence of external stimuli.
• Types:
❖ Auditory hallucinations - Patients hear sounds or voices that speak words,
phrases and sentences directly to the patient (second-person hallucination) or
talk to one another referring to the patient as s/he (third-person
hallucination).
❖ Tactile hallucinations - forms of tingling, burning
❖ somatic hallucinations - something happening inside the body such as a
snake crawling inside one’s stomach
❖ visual hallucinations - vague perceptions of colour or distinct visions of
people or objects
❖ gustatory hallucinations - food or drink taste strange
❖ olfactory hallucinations - smell of poison or smoke
Inappropriate affect - emotions that are unsuited to the situation
NEGATIVE SYMPTOMS - deficits of thought, emotion, and behaviour/ pathological
defecits
• Alogia - poverty of speech, i.e. a reduction in speech and speech content.
• Blunted affect - showing less anger, joy, and other feelings than most people do.
• Flat affect - no emotions
• Avolition or apathy - inability to start or complete a course of action/lack of will
power
Psychomotor symptoms:
• They move less spontaneously or make odd grimaces and gestures.
• These symptoms may take extreme forms known as catatonia.
• Types:
❖ Catatonic stupor: remain motionless and silent for long stretches of time.
❖ Catatonic rigidity: maintaining a rigid, upright posture for hours.
❖ Catatonic posturing: assuming awkward, bizarre positions for long periods
of time.
NEURODEVELOPMENTAL DISORDERS
• Manifest in the early stage of development even before the child enters school or
during the early stage of schooling.
• These disorders hamper personal, social, academic and occupational functioning.
• deficits or excesses in behaviours or delays in achieving a particular age-appropriate
behaviour.
• Types:
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder:
Inattention:
 ❖ difficult to sustain mental effort during work or play
❖ have a hard time keeping their minds on one thing or in following instructions.
❖ Common complaints - child does not listen, cannot concentrate, does not follow
instructions, is disorganised, easily distracted, forgetful, does not finish
assignments, and is quick to lose interest in boring activities.
Impulsive
❖ seem unable to control their immediate reactions or to think before they act.
❖ find it difficult to wait or take turns,
❖ have difficulty resisting immediate temptations or delaying gratification.
❖ Minor mishaps such as knocking things over are common whereas more serious
accidents and injuries can also occur.
Hyperactivity
❖ are in constant motion.
❖ Sitting still through a lesson is impossible for them.
❖ The child may fidget, squirm, climb and run around the room aimlessly.
❖ Parents and teachers describe them as ‘driven by a motor’
Autism Spectrum Disorder:
• impairments in social interaction and communication skills, and stereotyped patterns
of behaviours, interests and activities.
• difficulties in social interaction and communication, restricted range of interests, and
strong desire for routine.
• About 70 per cent with ASD have intellectual disabilities.
• Difficulties in relating to other people.
• unable to initiate social behaviour and unresponsive to other people’s feelings.
• unable to share experiences or emotions with others.
• Many never develop speech and those who do, have repetitive speech patterns.
• show narrow patterns of interests and repetitive behaviours such as lining up objects
or stereotyped body movements such as rocking.
• These motor movements may be self-stimulatory - hand flapping or self-injurious
banging their head against the wall.
• experience difficulties in starting, maintaining and even understanding relationships.
Intellectual disability
• below average intellectual functioning (with an IQ of approximately 70 or below),
• deficits or impairments in adaptive behaviour (i.e. in the areas of communication,
home living, social/interpersonal skills, functional academic skills, work, etc.)
• which are manifested before the age of 18 years.
Specific learning disorder
• difficulty in perceiving or processing information efficiently and accurately.
• gets manifested during early school years and the individual encounters problems in
basic skills in reading, writing and/or mathematics.
• The affected child tends to perform below average for her/his age.
• may be able to reach acceptable performance levels with additional inputs and efforts.
DISRUPTIVE, IMPULSE-CONTROL AND CONDUCT DISORDERS
Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD)
• display age-inappropriate amounts of stubbornness, are irritable, defiant, disobedient,
and behave in a hostile manner.
• Individuals with ODD do not see themselves as angry, oppositional, or defiant and
often justify their behaviour as reaction to circumstances/demands.
• Thus, the symptoms of the disorder become entangled with the problematic
interactions with others.
Conduct disorder and antisocial behaviour
• age-inappropriate actions and attitudes that violate family expectations, societal
norms, and the personal or property rights of others.
• The behaviours include aggressive actions that cause or threaten harm to people or
animals, nonaggressive conduct that causes property damage, major deceitfulness or
theft, and serious rule violations.
• Types of aggression:
❖ verbal aggression - name-calling, swearing
❖ physical aggression - hitting, fighting
❖ Hostile aggression - directed at inflicting injury to others
❖ Proactive aggression - dominating and bullying others without provocation
Feeding and Eating Disorders
Anorexia nervosa
• The individual has a distorted body image that leads her/ him to see herself/himself as
overweight.
• Often refusing to eat, exercising compulsively and developing unusual habits such as
refusing to eat in front of others, the person with anorexia may lose large amounts of
weight and even starve herself/himself to death.
Bulimia nervosa
• The individual may eat excessive amounts of food, then purge her/his body of food by
using medicines such as laxatives or diuretics or by vomiting.
• The person often feels disgusted and ashamed when s/he binges and is relieved of
tension and negative emotions after purging.
Binge eating
• There are frequent episodes of out-of-control eating.
• The individual tends to eat at a higher speed than normal and continues eating till s/he
feels uncomfortably full.
• large amount of food may be eaten even when the individual is not feeling hungry
SUBSTANCE-RELATED AND ADDICTIVE DISORDERS
• Disorders relating to maladaptive behaviours resulting from regular and consistent use
of the substance involved are included under substance related and addictive
disorders.
• These disorders include problems associated with the use and abuse of alcohol,
cocaine, tobacco and opiods among others, which alter the way people think, feel and
behave.
Alcohol
• People who abuse alcohol drink large amounts to help them face difficult situations.
• The drinking interferes with their social behaviour and ability to think and work.
• Their bodies build up a tolerance for alcohol and they need to drink greater amounts
to feel its effects.
• They also experience withdrawal responses when they stop drinking.
Effects of Alcohol
• Alcoholism destroys millions of families, social relationships and careers.
• Intoxicated drivers are responsible for many road accidents.
• Children of Alcoholics have higher rates of psychological problems, particularly
anxiety, depression, phobias and substance-related disorders.
• Excessive drinking can seriously damage physical health.
Heroin
• Most abusers develop a dependence on heroin, building up a tolerance for it, and
experiencing a withdrawal reaction when they stop taking it.
• The most direct danger of heroin abuse is an overdose, which slows down the
respiratory centres in the brain, almost paralysing breathing, and in many cases
causing death.
Cocaine
• Regular use of cocaine leads to staying intoxicated throughout the day and function
poorly in social relationships and at work.
• It may also cause problems in short-term memory and attention.
• Dependence develop, and cocaine dominates the person’s life
• Cocaine poses serious dangers on psychological and physical well-being.
 CHAPTER 5 – THERAPEUTIC APPROACHES
NATURE AND PROCESS OF PSYCHOTHERAPY
Characteristics of Psychotherapeutic approaches:
• there is systematic application of principles
• persons who have practical training can practice psychotherapy because an untrained
person may cause more harm than good
• the therapeutic situation involves a therapist and a client who seeks and receives help
for her/his emotional problems
• the interaction of these two persons — the therapist and the client — results in the
formation of the therapeutic relationship.
• This is a confidential, interpersonal, and dynamic relationship.
• This human relationship is central to any sort of psychological therapy and is the
vehicle for change.
Goals of Psychotherapies:
• Reinforcing client’s resolve for betterment.
• Lessening emotional pressure.
• Unfolding the potential for positive growth.
• Modifying habits.
• Changing thinking patterns.
• Increasing self-awareness.
• Improving interpersonal relations and communication.
• Facilitating decision-making.
• Becoming aware of one’s choices in life.
• Relating to one’s social environment in a more creative and self-aware manner.
Therapeutic Relationship
What is a therapeutic alliance?
The special relationship between the client and the therapist is known as the therapeutic
relationship or alliance.
What are the 2 components of therapeutic relationship?
• The first component is the contractual nature of the relationship in which the client
and the therapist, enter into a partnership which aims at helping the client overcome
her/his problems.
• The second component is the limited duration of the therapy. This alliance lasts until
the client becomes able to deal with her/his problems and take control of her/ his life.
What are the unique properties of therapeutic relationship?
• It is a trusting relationship and this high level of trust enables the client to unburden
herself/himself to the therapist and talk about her/his psychological and personal
problems to them.
• The therapist encourages this by being accepting, empathic, genuine and warm to the
client.
What is unconditional positive regard?
• The therapist conveys by her/his words and behaviours that s/he is not judging the
client and will continue to show the same positive feelings towards the client even if
the client is rude or confides all the ‘wrong’ things that s/he may have done or thought
about.
What is Empathy?
• Empathy is different from sympathy and intellectual understanding
• In sympathy, one has compassion and pity towards the suffering
• Intellectual understanding is cold in the sense that the person is unable to feel like the
other
person and does not feel sympathy either.
• On the other hand, empathy is present when one is able to understand the plight of
another person, and feel like the other person.
• It means understanding things from the other person’s perspective, i.e. putting oneself
in the other person’s shoes.
Why do you think Confidentiality is required for an effective therapeutic relationship?
• The therapeutic alliance requires that the therapist must keep strict confidentiality of
the experiences, events, feelings or thoughts disclosed by the client.
• The therapist must not exploit the trust and the confidence of the client in anyway.
TYPES OF THERAPIES
❖ PSYCHODYNAMIC
❖ BEHAVIOURAL
❖ HUMANISTIC EXISTENTIAL
Classification of therapies based on the five parameters:
Psychodynamic Behavioural Humanistic
existential
What is the cause, Intra-psychic faulty learning of the meaning of one’s
which has led to the conflicts behaviours and life and existence are
problem? cognitions. the cause of
psychological
problems
How did the cause unfulfilled desires of Faulty It is the current
come into existence? childhood and conditioning patterns, feelings of
unresolved childhood faulty learning, loneliness, alienation,
fears and faulty thinking sense of futility of
and beliefs one’s existence, etc.,
What is the chief Psychoanalysis identifies the faulty The existential
method of Free association, conditioning patterns therapy provides a
treatment? Dream analysis provides behavioural therapeutic
strategies to improve environment which is
behaviour. The positive, accepting,
cognitive methods and non judgmental.
helps remove the The client arrives at
faulty the solutions through
thinking patterns of a process of personal
the client growth
What is the nature assume that Assume that The therapist merely
of the therapeutic the therapist is the therapist is provides a warm,
relationship capable of arriving at capable of arriving at empathic relationship
between the client solutions to the solutions to the in which the client
and the client’s problems. client’s problems feels secure to
therapist? explore the nature
and causes of her/his
problems by
herself/himself.
What is the chief Psychodynamic The behaviour The humanistic
benefit to the client? therapy values therapy considers therapy values
emotional insight as changing faulty personal growth as
the important benefit behaviour and the chief benefit.
that the client derives thought patterns to
from the treatment. adaptive ones as the
chief benefit of the
treatment.
What is the Several years Few weeks to months Few weeks to months
duration of
treatment?
Behaviour Therapy:
Introduction:
❖ Behaviour therapies believes that psychological distress arises because of faulty
behaviour patterns or thought patterns.
❖ The focus is only on the present and the past is relevant only to understand the origins
of the faulty behaviour and thought patterns.
❖ Behaviour therapy is not a unified theory
❖ The symptoms of the client and the clinical diagnosis are the guiding factors in the
selection of the specific techniques or interventions to be applied.
❖ Different problems would be treated differently using different strategies.
Method of Treatment.
• Behavioural analysis is conducted to find malfunctioning behaviours
• Malfunctioning behaviours are those behaviours which cause distress to the client.
• Antecedent factors (Causal factors) are those causes which predispose the person to
indulge in that behaviour.
• Maintaining factors are those factors which lead to the persistence of the faulty
behaviour.
• Example - Young person----smoking------Antecedent factor(exam stress)--
Maintaining factor(Relief)
• The aim of the treatment is to extinguish or eliminate the faulty behaviours and
substitute them with adaptive behaviour patterns.
Antecedent operations: making changes in the causal factors also called establishing
operation
Consequent operations: follows the appropriate behaviour
Example: a child gives trouble in eating dinner
Antecedent operation/ establishing operation: decrease the quantity of food served at tea
time.
Consequent operation: is praising the child for eating dinner.
Behavioural Techniques
• Negative reinforcement: refers to following an undesired response with an outcome
that is painful or not liked. For example, the teacher reprimands a child who shouts in
class. This is negative reinforcement.
• Aversive conditioning: refers to repeated association of undesired response with an
aversive consequence. For example, an alcoholic is given a mild electric shock and
asked to smell the alcohol.
 • Positive reinforcement is given to increase the deficit. For example, if a child does
not do homework regularly, positive reinforcement may be used by the child’s mother
by preparing the child’s favourite dish whenever s/he does homework at the appointed
time.
• Token economy: Persons with behavioural problems can be given a token as a
reward every time a wanted behaviour occurs. The tokens are collected and
exchanged for a reward such as an outing
• Differential reinforcement.
1. Positive reinforcement for the wanted behaviour and negative
reinforcement for the unwanted behaviour attempted together may be one such
method.
2. The other method is to positively reinforce the wanted behaviour and ignore the
unwanted behaviour.
• The second method is less painful and equally effective.
• For example, let us consider a girl who sulks and cries when she is not taken to the
cinema
• The parent is instructed to take her to the cinema if she does not cry but not to take
her if she cries and also to ignore the girl when she cries
• The wanted behaviour of politely asking to be taken to the cinema increases and the
unwanted behaviour of crying and sulking decreases.
Systematic desensitisation - Wolpe - treating phobias or irrational fears.
• the therapist prepares a hierarchy of anxiety-provoking stimuli with the least anxiety-
provoking stimuli at the bottom of the hierarchy.
• The therapist relaxes the client and asks the client to think about the least anxiety-
provoking situation.
• . The client is asked to stop thinking of the fearful situation if the slightest tension is
felt.
• Over sessions, the client is able to imagine more severe fear-provoking situations
while maintaining the relaxation.
• The client gets systematically desensitised to the fear.
The principle of reciprocal inhibition: This principle states that the presence of two
mutually opposing forces at the same time, inhibits the weaker force
Before desensitiization
Stronger force – Fear ; Weaker force : Relaxation
After Desensitization
Stronger force – Relaxation ; Weaker force – Fear
Modelling: the client learns to behave in a certain way by observing the behaviour of a role
model or the therapist who initially acts as the role model.
Vicarious learning - learning by observing others
Cognitive Therapy
Cause of psychological distress: irrational thoughts and beliefs.
Rational Emotive Therapy (RET) - Albert Ellis
• The central thesis of this therapy is that irrational beliefs mediate between the
antecedent events and their consequences.
• The first step in RET is the antecedentbelief-consequence (ABC) analysis.
 • Antecedent events, which caused the psychological distress, are noted and the
irrational beliefs are assessed through questionnaires
• These beliefs are characterised by thoughts with ‘musts’ and ‘shoulds’,
• Example:
• “One should be loved by everybody all the time”,
• This distorted perception of the antecedent event due to the irrational belief leads to
the consequence, i.e. negative emotions and behaviours.
• In the process of RET, the irrational beliefs are attacked by the therapist through non-
directive questioning which is gentle that makes the client to think deeper into
her/his assumptions about life
• Gradually the client is able to change the irrational beliefs by making a change in
her/his philosophy about life thereby reducing the psychological distress.
Cognitive Therapy – Aaron Beck
• His theory states that childhood experiences provided by the family and society
develop core schemas or systems, which include beliefs and action patterns in the
individual.
• A client, who was neglected by the parents as a child, develops the core schema of “I
am not wanted”.
• During the course of life, another critical incident occurs in her/his life where S/he is
publicly ridiculed by the teacher in school.
• This critical incident triggers the core schema of “I am not wanted” leading to the
development of negative automatic thoughts.
• Negative thoughts are persistent irrational thoughts such as “nobody loves me”, “I
am ugly”, “I am stupid”, “I will not succeed”, etc.
• Such negative automatic thoughts are characterised by cognitive distortions.
• Cognitive distortions are ways of thinking which are general in nature but which
distort the reality in a negative manner.
• These patterns of thought are called dysfunctional cognitive structures which leads
to the development of feelings of anxiety and depression.
• The therapist uses questioning, which is gentle,
• Example: “Why should everyone love you?”, “What does it mean to you to
succeed?”
• The questions make the client think in a direction opposite to that of the negative
automatic thoughts whereby s/he gains insight into the nature and alter the thought
process
Cognitive Behaviour Therapy
• CBT is a short and effective treatment for a wide range of psychological disorders
• CBT adopts a bio-psychosocial approach
• It combines cognitive therapy with behavioural techniques.
• It believes that the client’s distress is due to the biological, psychological, and social
factors
• biological problems is addressed through
• psychological: through behaviour therapy and cognitive therapy
• social: with environmental manipulations
Humanistic-existential Therapy
• Psychological distress arises from feelings of loneliness, alienation, and an inability to
find meaning and genuine fulfilment in life.
• Human beings are motivated by the desire for personal growth and self-actualisation
• When these needs are blocked by society and family, human beings experience
psychological distress.
• Self-actualisation is defined as an innate or inborn force that moves the person to
become more complex, balanced, and integrated, i.e. achieving the complexity
and balance without being fragmented.
• Just as lack of food or water causes distress, frustration of self-actualisation also
causes distress.
• Healing occurs when the client is able to remove the obstacles from reaching self-
actualisation
• Self-actualisation requires free emotional expression.
• The family and society curb emotional expression
• Therefore, the therapy creates a non-judgmental and accepting atmosphere in which
the client’s emotions can be freely expressed
• The therapist is merely a facilitator and guide to expand the clients’ awareness
• It is the client who is responsible for the success of therapy.
• The client initiates the process of self-growth through which healing takes place
Existential Therapy -
Victor Frankl - Logotherapy.
• Logos is the Greek word for soul and Logotherapy means treatment for the soul.
• Frankl calls this process of finding meaning even in life-threatening by finding the
spiritual truth of one’s existence.
• According to him, there is a spiritual unconscious, which is the storehouse of love,
aesthetic awareness, and values of life.
• Neurotic anxieties arise when the problems of life are attached to the physical,
psychological or spiritual aspects of one’s existence.
• Frankl gave importance to spiritual anxieties that leads to meaninglessness
• The goal of logotherapy is to help the patients to find meaning in their life and
encourages the clients to find meaning in their life.
• In Logotherapy, the therapist is open and shares her/his feelings, values and his/her
own existence with the client.
• The emphasis is on here and now as he keeps reminding of the immediacy of the
present.
Client-centred Therapy – Carl Rogers
• Rogers brought the concept of self, with freedom and choice as the core aspect
• The therapist shows empathy, i.e. understanding the client’s experience from his
point of view- this creates an emotional bonding between the therapist and client
• unconditional positive regard, i.e. total acceptance of the client as s/he - the
positive warmth of the therapist is not dependent on what the client reveals
• The client feels secured and develops trust on the therapist.
• The therapist reflects the feelings of the client in a nonjudgmental manner.
 • This process of reflection helps the client to become integrated and becomes her/his
real self with the therapist working as a facilitator.
Gestalt Therapy
• The German word gestalt means ‘whole’.
• This therapy was given by Freiderick (Fritz) Perls together with his wife Laura Perls.
• The goal of gestalt therapy is to increase an individual’s self-awareness and self-
acceptance by recognizing the bodily processes and the emotions that are being
blocked
• The therapist does this by encouraging the client to act out feelings and conflicts.
Factors Contributing to Healing in Psychotherapy
• A major factor in the healing is the techniques adopted by the therapist. Techniques
should be relevant to the problem experienced by the client.
• The therapeutic alliance with warmth and empathy has healing properties
• While the patient/client is being interviewed in the initial sessions to understand the
nature of the problem, s/he unburdens the emotional problems being faced.
• This process of emotional unburdening is known as catharsis
• Non-specific factors - client/patient ( patient variables) - motivation for change,
expectation of improvement due to the treatment, etc.
• Non-specific factors - therapist (therapist variables) - positive nature, absenceof
unresolved emotional conflicts, presence of good mental health,
Ethics in Psychotherapy
• Informed consent
• Confidentiality
• Alleviating personal distress and suffering should be the goal
• Integrity of the practitioner-client relationship
• Respect for human rights and dignity.
• Professional competence and skills are essential
Alternative Therapies
• Yoga - the asana or body posture/ breathing practices or pranayama/combination of
the two.
• Meditation -the practice of focusing attention on breath or on an object or thought or
a mantra
• Vipasana meditation, also known as mindfulness-based meditation, there is no
fixed object or thought to hold the attention which helps in reducing depression.
• Sudarshana Kriya Yoga (SKY) - The rapid breathing techniques to induce
hyperventilation is found to be a beneficial to the treatment of stress, anxiety, post
traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, stress related medical illnesses,
substance abuse, and rehabilitation of criminal offenders.
• SKY has been used as a technique to reduce PTSD and alcoholic patients who
practice SKY have reduced depression and stress levels.
• Research conducted at the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences
(NIMHANS), India, has shown that SKY reduces depression.
• Yoga techniques enhance well-being, mood, attention, mental focus, stress tolerance
and also problems like insomnia.
• Proper training by a skilled teacher and a 30-minute practice every day shows
effective results
• Kundalini Yoga taught in the USA has been found to be effective in treatment of
mental disorders like OCD
• Kundalini Yoga combines pranayama or breathing techniques with chanting of
mantras.
REHABILITATION OF THE MENTALLY ILL
The treatment of psychological disorders has two components
• reduction of symptoms
• improving the level of functioning or quality of life.
• In rehabilitation, the patients are given
❖ occupational therapy - patients are taught skills such as candle making,
paper bag making and weaving to help them to form a work discipline
❖ social skills training – develop interpersonal skills through role play
❖ Occupational therapy - to teach the patient to function in a social group.
❖ Cognitive retraining – to improve the basic cognitive functions of
attention, memory and executive functions.
 CHAPTER 6
ATTITUDE AND SOCIAL COGNITION
NATURE AND COMPONENTS OF ATTITUDE
How attitudes are considered more important than opinions?
• Some topics that you discuss in our day to day life may be only moderately important
to you;
• It does not matter much to you that others agree or disagree with your views.
• But there are some other topics are extremely important to you.
• If someone opposes or challenges your views about these topics, you get emotional.
• You may have made some of these views part of your behaviour.
• In other words, if your views are not merely thoughts, but also have emotional and
action components, then these views are more than ‘opinions’; they are examples of
attitudes.
Components of Attitude
• All definitions of attitudes agree that an attitude is a state of the mind, a set of
views, or thoughts, regarding some topic (called the ‘attitude object’)
• The thought component is referred to as the cognitive aspect,
• the emotional component is known as the affective aspect,
• and the tendency to act is called the behavioural (or conative) aspect.
• Taken together, these three aspects have been referred to as the A-B-C components
(Affective-BehaviouralCognitive components) of attitude.
• Example :Green Environment
Beliefs
• Beliefs refer to the cognitive component of attitudes, and form the ground on which
attitudes stand, such as belief in God, or belief in democracy as a political ideology.
Values
• Values are attitudes or beliefs that contain a ‘should’ or ‘ought’ aspect, such as moral
or ethical values.
• One example of a value is the idea that one should work hard, or that one should
always be honest, because honesty is the best policy.
Four significant features of attitudes
Valence:
• The valence of an attitude tells us whether an attitude is positive or negative towards
the attitude object.
• Suppose an attitude (say, towards nuclear research) has to be expressed on a 5-point
scale, ranging from 1 (Very bad), 2 (Bad), 3 (Neutral — neither good nor bad), and 4
(Good), to 5 (Very good).
• If an individual rates her/his view towards nuclear research as 4 or 5, this is clearly a
positive attitude.
• On the other hand, if the rating is 1 or 2, the attitude is negative. This means that the
person dislikes the idea of nuclear research, and thinks it is something bad.
Extremeness :
• The extremeness of an attitude indicates how positive or negative an attitude is.
• Taking the nuclear research example given above, a rating of 1 and 5 are extreme
• Ratings of 2 and 4 are less extreme.
• A neutral attitude(3), is lowest on extremeness
Simplicity or Complexity (multiplexity) :
• An attitude system is said to be ‘simple’ if it contains only one or a few attitudes, and
‘complex’ if it is made up of many attitudes.
• Consider the example of attitude towards health and well-being. This attitude system
is likely to consist of several ‘member’ attitudes, such as physical and mental health,
views about happiness and well-being
• By contrast, the attitude towards a particular person is likely to consist of mainly one
attitude.
• Each member attitude that belongs to an attitude system also has A-B-C components.
Centrality:
• An attitude with greater centrality would influence the other attitudes in the system
much more than the non-central (or peripheral) attitudes
• For example, in the attitude towards world peace, a negative attitude towards high
military expenditure may be present as a core or central attitude that influences all
other attitudes
Process of Attitude Formation
Learning attitudes by association :
• You might have seen that students often develop a liking for a particular subject
because of the teacher.
• This is because they see many positive qualities in that teacher; these positive
qualities get linked to the subject that s/he teaches and the4 child starts developing
liking for the subject.
• In other words, a positive attitude towards the subject is learned through the positive
association between a teacher and a student.
Learning attitudes by being rewarded or punished :
• If an individual is praised for showing a particular attitude, s/he will develop that
attitude further.
• For example, if a teenager does yogasanas regularly, and gets the honour of being
‘Miss Good Health’ in her school, she may develop a positive attitude towards yoga.
• Similarly, if a child constantly falls ill because s/he eats junk food instead of proper
meals, then the child is likely to develop a negative attitude towards junk food, and
also a positive attitude towards eating healthy food.
Learning attitudes through modelling (observing others) :
• We learn attitude by observing others being rewarded or punished for expressing
thoughts, or showing behaviour of a particular kind
• For example, children may form a respectful attitude towards elders, by observing
that their parents show respect for elders, and are appreciated for it.
Learning attitudes through group or cultural norms:
• Learning attitudes through group or cultural norms may actually be an example of all
three forms of learning described above — learning through association, reward or
punishment, and modelling.
• For example, offering money, sweets, fruit and flowers in a place of worship is a
normative behaviour in some religions.
• When individuals see that such behaviour is shown by others, is expected and socially
approved, they may ultimately develop a positive attitude towards such behaviour
Learning through exposure to information :
• Many attitudes are learned not necessarily in the physical presence of others.
 • both positive and negative attitudes are being formed through a lot of information
from the media
• By reading the biographies of self-actualised persons, an individual may develop a
positive attitude towards hard work and other aspects as the means of achieving
success in life.
Factors that Influence Attitude Formation
1. Family and School Environment :
• In the early years of life, parents and other family members play a significant role
in shaping attitude formation.
• Later, the school environment becomes an important background for attitude
formation.
• Learning of attitudes within the family and school usually takes place by
❖ association,
❖ rewards and punishments, and
❖ modelling.
2. Reference Groups :
• Reference groups indicate to an individual what is acceptable ad not acceptable
• Thus, we learn attitudes through group or cultural norms.
• Attitudes towards various topics, such as political, religious and other issues are
often developed through reference groups
• Their influence is noticeable especially during the beginning of adolescence
• The role of reference groups in attitude formation may also be a case of learning
through reward and punishment.
3. Personal Experiences :
• Direct personal experiences bring about a drastic change in our attitude
• Here is a real-life example.
❖ A driver in the army went through a personal experience that transformed
his life,
❖ On one mission, he narrowly escaped death although all his companions
got killed.
❖ Wondering about the purpose of his own life, he gave up his job in the
army, returned to his native village in Maharashtra, and worked actively as
a community leader.
4. Media-related Influences :
• Technological advances have made audio-visual media and the Internet very
powerful sources of information that lead to attitude formation and change.
• School level textbooks also influence attitude formation.
• These sources first strengthen the cognitive and affective components of
attitudes,and subsequently may also affect the behavioural component.
• The media can exert both good and bad influences on attitudes
Attitude change
Process of Attitude Change
Concept of Balance – Fritz Heider
• The basic idea is that an attitude changes if there is a state of imbalance
• This is because imbalance is logically uncomfortable.
• Therefore, the attitude changes in the direction of balance
Imbalance:
(i) all three sides of the P-O-X triangle are negative
 (ii) Two sides are positive, and one side is negative.
Balance:
(i) all three sides are positive
(ii) Two sides are negative, and one side is positive.
• Consider the example of dowry as an attitude topic (X).
• Suppose a person (P) has a positive attitude towards dowry (P-X positive).
• P is planning to get his son married to the daughter of some person (O) who has a
negative attitude towards dowry (O-X negative)
• If O initially has a positive attitude towards P, the situation would be unbalanced.
• P-X is positive, O-P is positive, but O-X is negative.
• That is, there are two positives and one negative in the triangle.
• One of the three attitudes will therefore have to change.
• This change could take place in the P-X relationship (P starts disliking dowry as a
custom), or in the O-X relationship (O starts liking dowry as a custom), or in the
O-P relationship (O starts disliking P).
Cognitive dissonance – Leon Festinger
• The basic idea is that the cognitive components of an attitude must be ‘consonant’
(opposite of ‘dissonant’), i.e., they should be logically in line with each other.
• If an individual finds that two0 cognitions are dissonant, then one of them will be
changed to consonance.
• For example
Cognition I: Pan masala causes mouth cancer which is fatal.
Cognition II: I eat pan masala.
• Holding these two ideas or cognition will make any individual feel that something is
‘out of tune’, or dissonant, in the attitude towards pan masala.
• Therefore, one of these ideas will have to be changed, to attain consonance
• In the example given above, in order to reduce the dissonance, I will stop eating pan
masala (change Cognition II) would be the sensible way of reducing dissonance
Cognitive consistency
• Means that two components, aspects or elements of the attitude, or attitude system,
must be in the same direction and logically fall in line with other elements.
• If this does not happen, then the person experiences a kind of mental discomfort
• In such a state, some aspect in the attitude system changes in the direction of
consistency, because our cognitive system requires logical consistency.
The two-step concept - S.M. Mohsin
• Attitude change takes place in the form of two steps.
• In the first step, the target of change identifies with the source.
• The ‘target’ is the person whose attitude is to be changed and ‘source’ influences the
target to change.
• Identification means that the target has liking and regard for the source.
• S/he puts herself/himself in the place of the source, and tries to feel like her/him.
• The source must also have a positive attitude towards the target, and the regard and
attraction becomes mutual.
• In the second step, the source herself/himself shows an attitude change and by
observing the source’s changed attitude, the target also shows an attitude change.
• This is a kind of imitation or observational learning.
 For example:
• Preeti reads in the newspapers that a particular soft drink that she enjoys is
extremely harmful.
• But her favourite sportsperson has been advertising the same soft drink. Since she
identifies with the sportsperson, she would like to imitate her/him.
• Now, suppose the sportsperson wishes to change people’s attitude towards this
soft drink from positive to negative, he actually change her/his own habit of
consuming that soft drink
• (Step I) — perhaps by substituting it with a health drink, it is very likely that now
Preeti will also change her attitude, and stop consuming the harmful soft drink
(Step II)
Factors that Influence Attitude Change
• Characteristics of the existing attitude :
❖ valence (positivity or negativity) – positive attitudes are easy to change than negative
attitudes
❖ extremeness - difficult
❖ simplicity- easy
❖ complexity (multiplexity) - difficult
❖ centrality – difficult
• Direction
❖ Congruent: same direction(positive becomes more positive/ negative
becomes more negative(women empowerment)
❖ Incongruent: opposite direction (positive becomes less positive or negative/
negative becomes less negative or positive(women empowerment)
• Direction of the information
Attitude may change in the direction of information that is presented, or in a direction
opposite to that of the information presented.(Dental cavity)
• Source characteristics :
❖ Source credibility: Attitudes are more likely to change when the message comes
from a highly credible source rather than from a low-credible source.(Laptop –
software engineer &student)
❖ Attractiveness: Message delivered by popular figures(Advertisements)
• Message characteristics:
❖ Rational appeal: For example, an advertisement for cooking food in a
pressure cooker may point out that this saves fuel such as cooking gas (LPG)
and is economical (rational appeal).
❖ Emotional appeal: The advertisement may say that pressure-cooking
preserves nutrition, and that if one cares for the family, nutrition would be a
major concern (emotional appeal)
❖ Motives: For example, drinking milk may be said to make a person healthy
and good-looking or more energetic and more successful at one’s job
❖ Mode of spreading the message: Face-to-face transmission of the message is
usually more effective than indirect transmission.(Ex: Awareness on ORS
through camps in villages)
• Target characteristics :
❖ Persuasibility – Flexible- easy to change
❖ Strong prejudices- difficult
❖ Self-esteem – high – difficult/ low- easy
 ❖ Intelligence – high – difficult/low-easy
• Attitude-Behaviour Relationship
When can you have a consistency between attitudes and behaviour?
• the attitude is strong
• the person is aware of her/his attitude,
• there is very little or no external pressure
• the person’s behaviour is not being watched or evaluated by others
• the person thinks that the behaviour would have a positive consequence (Ex:
Chinese couple travelling in US and staying in different hotels - Richard La
Piere, an American social psychologist)
PREJUDICE AND DISCRIMINATION
• Prejudices are examples of attitudes towards a particular group (usually negative)
• Stereotypes (the cognitive component): a cluster of ideas regarding the
characteristics of a specific group.
• All members belonging to this group are assumed to possess these characteristics that
leads to negative attitude about the group
• The cognitive component: negative ideas/opinions
• The affective component: dislike or hatred
• The behavioural component: Discrimination
• Examples : The genocide committed by the Nazis in Germany against Jewish people
is an extreme example of how prejudice can lead to hatred, discrimination and mass
killing of innocent people.
• Prejudices can exist without discrimination.
• Similarly, discrimination can be shown without prejudice.
Sources of Prejudice:
Learning :
• prejudices can also be learned through association, reward and punishment,
observing others, group or cultural norms and exposure to information
• The family, reference groups, personal experiences and the media may play a role in
the learning of prejudices
• People who learn prejudiced attitudes may develop a ‘prejudiced personality’( low
adjusting capacity, anxiety, and feelings of hostility against the outgroup.)
A strong social identity and ingroup0 bias :
• Individuals who have a very positive attitude towards their own group boost this
attitude by holding negative attitudes towards other groups.
Scapegoating :
• The majority group places the blame on a minority outgroup for its own social,
economic or political problems.
Kernel of truth concept :
• People think that, after all, there must be some truth, or ‘kernel of truth’ in what
everyone says about the other group.
Self-fulfilling prophecy :
• The target group may behave in ways that justify the prejudice, that is, confirm the
negative expectations.
• For example, if the target group is described as ‘dependent’, the members of this
target group may actually behave in a way that proves this description to be true.

STRATEGIES FOR HANDLING PREJUDICE

Aims:
• minimising opportunities for learning prejudices,
• changing such attitudes,
• de-emphasising a narrow social identity based on the ingroup, and
• discouraging the tendency towards self- fulfilling prophecy
These goals can be accomplished through :
• Education and information for correcting stereotypes related to specific target groups
• Increasing intergroup contact for direct communication and removal of mistrust
How can these goals be successfully achieved?
• the two groups meet in a cooperative rather than competitive context
• close interactions between the groups helps them to know each other better
• The two groups are not different in power or status.
• Highlighting individual identity rather than group identity
 CHAPTER 7
SOCIAL INFLUENCE AND GROUP PROCESSES
What is a Group? (Definition)
A group may be defined as an organized system of two or more individuals, who are interacting and
interdependent, who have common motives, have a set of role relationships among its members, and
have norms that regulate the behaviour of its members.
Characteristics of groups:
• A social unit consisting of two or more individuals who perceive themselves as belonging to
the group which helps in distinguishing one group from the other and gives the group its
unique identity.
• A collection of individuals who have common motives and goals.
• A collection of individuals who are interdependent, i.e. what one is doing may have
consequences for others.
• Individuals who are trying to satisfy a need through their joint association
• A gathering of individuals who interact with one another either directly or indirectly.
• A collection of individuals whose interactions are structured by a set of roles and norms.
Norms tell us how we ought to behave in the group
Crowd: is also a collection of people who may be present at a place/situation by chance.
Team: Teams are special kinds of groups. Members of teams often have complementary skills and are
committed to a common goal or purpose.
Difference between a Team and Group:
• In groups, performance is dependent on contributions of individual members. In teams, both
individual contributions and teamwork matter.
• In groups, the leader of the group holds responsibility for the work. However in teams,
although there is a leader, members hold themselves responsible.
Audience: is also a collection of people who have assembled for a special purpose, may be to watch
a cricket match or a movie.
Why Do People Join Groups?
• Security : When we are alone, we feel insecure. Groups reduce this insecurity. Being with
people gives a sense of comfort, and protection.
• Status : When we are members of a group that is perceived to be important by others, we feel
recognised and experience a sense of power. Suppose your school wins in an interinstitutional
debate competition, you feel proud and think that you are better than others.
• Self-esteem : Groups provide feelings of self-worth and establish a positive social identity.
• Satisfaction of one’s psychological and social needs : Groups satisfy one’s social and
psychological needs such as sense of belongingness, giving and receiving attention, love, and
power through a group.
• Goal achievement : Groups help in achieving such goals which cannot be attained
individually. There is power in the majority.
• Provide knowledge and information : Group membership provides knowledge and
information and thus broadens our view. As individuals, we may not have all the required
information. Groups supplement this information and knowledge.
How do we form Groups?
Proximity:(Nearness/Closeness):
• Repeated interactions with the same set of individuals give us a chance to know them, and
their interests and attitudes.
• Common interests, attitudes, and background are important determinants of your liking for
your group members
• Ex: friends from the same colony or apartments

Similarity :
• Why do we like people who are similar?
 • One explanation is that people prefer consistency and like relationships that are consistent.
When two people are similar, there is consistency and they start liking each other.
• Ex: you like playing football and another person in your class also loves playing football;
there is a matching of your interests. There are higher chances that you may become friends.
• Another explanation is that when we meet similar people, they accept and approve our
opinions and values, we feel we are right and thus we start liking them.
• Ex: Suppose you are of the opinion that too much watching of television is not good, because
it shows too much violence. You meet someone who also has similar views and he validates
your opinion, and you start liking the person.
Common motives and goals:
• When people have common motives or goals, they get together and form a group, which may
help them attain the goal.
Ex: Suppose you want to teach children in a slum area who are unable to go to school. You
cannot do this alone and therefore, you form a group of like-minded friends and start teaching
these children.
Stages of Group Formation:
Forming: When group members first meet, there is a great deal of uncertainty about the group, the
goal, and how it is to be achieved. People try to know each other and assess whether they will fit in.
There is excitement as well as apprehensions.
• Storming: In this stage, there is a stage of intragroup conflict among members about how the target
of the group is to be achieved, who is to control the group and its resources, and who is to perform
what task.
• Norming. Group members by this time develop norms related to group behaviour. This leads to
development of a positive group identity.
• Performing. By this time, the group moves towards achieving the group goal. For some groups, this
may be the last stage of group development.
• Adjourning: For some groups, for example, in the case of an organising committee, for a school
function, there may be another stage known as adjourning stage. In this stage, once the function is
over, the group may be disbanded.
Four important elements of group structure:
Roles:
• These are socially defined expectations that individuals in a given situation are expected to
fulfil.
Example: You have the role of a son or a daughter and with this role, there are certain role
expectations, i.e : As a daughter or a son, you are expected to respect elders, listen to them,
and be responsible towards your studies.
Norms:
• These are expected standards of behaviour and beliefs established, agreed upon, and enforced
by group members.
• They are a group’s ‘unspoken rules’.
• Example: In your family, there are norms that guide the behaviour of family members.
Status
• This refers to the relative social position given to group members by others.
• Being members of the group, we enjoy the status associated with that group.
• All of us, therefore, strive to be members of such groups which are high in status
• Even within a group, different members have different prestige and status.
Example:
• Captain of a cricket team has a higher status compared to the other members, although all are
equally important for the team’s success.

Types of status:
• Ascribed: This relative position or status may be either ascribed (given may be because of
one’s seniority)
 • Achieved: The person has achieved status because of expertise or hard work.
Cohesiveness:
• Cohesiveness refers to togetherness, binding, or mutual attraction among group members.
• When group becomes more cohesive, group members start to think and feel as a part of the
group and feel less isolated.
• Members of a highly cohesive group have a greater desire to remain in the group
• Cohesiveness refers to the team spirit or ‘we feeling’
• It is difficult to leave a cohesive group or to gain membership of a group which is
highly cohesive.
• Extreme cohesiveness may sometimes become dangerous and might lead to Group Think
Group think:
• Irving Janis has suggested that cohesion can interfere with effective leadership and can lead to
disastrous decisions.
• Groupthink results in the tendency of decision makers to make irrational and uncritical
decisions.
• Groupthink is characterised by the appearance of unanimous agreement within a group.
• Each member believes that all members agree upon a particular decision or a policy.
• No one opposes the opinion because each person believes it would spoil the bonding of the
group and s/he would be unpopular.
• In order to preserve the group’s internal harmony, it becomes out-of-touch with reality.
• Groupthink occurs in socially homogenous groups that are isolated from
• Examples of several group decisions at the international level can be cited as illustrations of
groupthink phenomenon.
• The Vietnam War is an example. From 1964 to 1967, President Lyndon Johnson and his
advisors in the U.S. escalated the Vietnam War thinking that this would bring North Vietnam
to the peace table. The escalation decisions were made despite warnings. The grossly
miscalculated move resulted in the loss of 56,000 American and more than one million
Vietnamese lives and created huge budget deficits.
Ways to counteract or prevent groupthink:
• encouraging and rewarding critical thinking and even disagreement among group members,
• encouraging groups to present alternative courses of action
• inviting outside experts to evaluate the group’s decisions,
• encouraging members to seek feedback from trusted others
Types of Groups
Primary and Secondary Groups
PRIMARY GROUPS SECONDARY GROUPS
Primary groups are pre-existing formations which secondary groups are those which the individual
are usually given to the individual whereas joins by choice
Family, caste, and religion are primary groups membership of a political party is an example of
a secondary group
In a primary group, there is a face-to-face In contrast, secondary groups are those where
interaction, members have close physical relationships among members are more
proximity, and they share warm emotional bonds. impersonal, indirect, and less frequent.
• Primary groups are central to individual’s The secondary groups do not have a major role to
functioning and have a very major role in play in this area
developing values and ideals of the individual
during the early stages of development.
In the primary group, boundaries are less In secondary groups, it is easy to leave and join
permeable, i.e. members do not have the option to another group
choose its membership

Formal and Informal Groups

• These groups differ on the basis of structure and functions.
 • The functions of a formal group are explicitly stated as in the case of an office organisation.
• The roles to be performed by group members are stated
• The group follows specific rules or laws and members have definite roles which helps in
establishing order.
• A university is an example of a formal group.
• On the other hand, the formation of informal groups is not based on rules or laws and there is
close relationship among members.
In-group and Out-group
• The term ‘in-group’ refers to one’s own group, and ‘out-group’ refers to another group.
• For in-group members, we use the word ‘we’ while for out-group members, the word ‘they’ is
used.
• By using the words ‘they’ and ‘we’, one is categorizing people as similar or different.
• It has been found that persons in the in-group are generally supposed to be similar
• Members of the out-group are viewed differently and are often perceived negatively in
comparison to the in-group member
Social Facilitation
• Social facilitation research suggests that presence of others leads to arousal and can motivate
individuals to enhance their performance if they are already good at solving something.
• This enhancement occurs when a person’s efforts are individually evaluated.
Social Loafing
• Social loafing is a reduction in individual effort when working on a collective task, i.e. one in
which outputs are pooled with those of other group members.
• An example of such a task is the game of tug-of-war. It is not possible for you to identify
how much force each member of the team has been exerting.
• Such situations give opportunities to group members to relax and become a free rider.
• For example in an experiment conducted by Latane and his associates who asked group of
male students to clap or cheer as loudly as possible
• The experimenters were interested in knowing how much noise people make in social
settings.
• They varied the group size; individuals were either alone, or in groups of two, four and six.
• The results of the study showed that although the total amount of noise rose up, as size
increased, the amount of noise produced by each participant dropped.
• In other words, each participant put in less effort as the group size increased.
Why does social loafing occur?
• Group members feel less responsible for the overall task being performed
• Motivation of members decreases because they realise that individual contributions will not
be evaluated
• The performance of the group is not to be compared with other groups.
• There is an improper coordination (or no coordination) among members.
• Low sense of belongingness.
How can you reduce Social Loafing?
• Making the efforts of each person identifiable.
• Increasing the pressure to work hard
• Increasing the importance or value of a task.
• Making people feel that their individual contribution is important.
• Strengthening group cohesiveness which increases the motivation for successful group
outcome
Group Polarization:
• Suppose there is an employee who has been caught taking bribe or engaging in some
other unethical act.
• Her/his colleagues are asked to decide on what punishment s/he should be given.
 • They may let her/him go scot-free or decide to terminate her/his services instead of
imposing a punishment
• Whatever the initial position in the group, this position becomes much stronger as a
result of discussions in the group.
• This strengthening of the group’s initial position as a result of group interaction
and discussion is referred to as group polarization.

Why does group polarisation occur?

• Let us take an example whether capital punishment should be there.

• Suppose you favour capital punishment for heinous crimes, what would happen if you
were interacting with and discussing this issue with like-minded people?
• After this interaction, your views may become stronger.

This firm conviction is because of the following three reasons:

• In the company of like-minded people, your viewpoints will be favoured

• This will make you more favourable towards capital punishment.
• When you find others also favouring capital punishment, you feel that view is validated
by the public. This is a sort of bandwagon effect.
• When you find people having similar views, you are likely to perceive them as ingroup.