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Unit 5 Essentials

30 must-know vocabulary terms and the big ideas anchoring Unit 5: Mental and Physical Health.

Unit 5: Mental and Physical Health🏠 Unit Hub📁 Flashcards🗺 Cheat Sheet⭐ The Essentials🎙 Podcast🎨 Visual Review📝 MC Practice✍ FRQ Practice
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Health psychology
Studies how psychological, behavioral, and cultural factors influence physical health and illness.
Health
Stressors / stress response
Stressors challenge us; the stress response involves sympathetic nervous system arousal and the HPA axis.
Health
General Adaptation Syndrome
Selye's three-stage stress response: alarm, resistance, exhaustion.
Health
Fight-or-flight response
Sympathetic nervous system reaction to threat — heart rate up, blood to muscles, energy mobilized.
Health
Problem-focused coping
Coping strategy that changes the stressful situation itself.
Health
Emotion-focused coping
Coping strategy that manages the emotional reaction to a stressor without changing the situation.
Health
Tend-and-befriend response
Alternative stress response (especially in women): seeking social support and caring for others.
Health
Positive psychology
Seligman's movement studying strengths, virtues, and conditions for flourishing rather than just disorder.
Positive Psych
Subjective well-being
A person's self-evaluated happiness and life satisfaction.
Positive Psych
Gratitude & resilience
Gratitude and resilience are linked to greater well-being and better health outcomes.
Positive Psych
Psychological disorder
Mental health condition with clinically significant disturbance in thinking, feeling, or behavior causing distress or impairment.
Disorders
DSM-5-TR
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual — standard U.S. classification system for psychological disorders.
Disorders
Biopsychosocial model
Disorders explained as interaction of biological, psychological, and social/cultural factors.
Disorders
Diathesis-stress model
Genetic vulnerability + stressful experiences trigger disorders; neither alone is usually sufficient.
Disorders
Anxiety disorders
Generalized anxiety, panic disorder, specific phobias — excessive fear disrupting daily life.
Disorders
OCD
Persistent intrusive thoughts (obsessions) and repetitive anxiety-reducing behaviors (compulsions).
Disorders
PTSD
Flashbacks, nightmares, hypervigilance, and avoidance lasting more than a month after trauma.
Disorders
Major depressive disorder
Prolonged sad mood, anhedonia, cognitive and physical symptoms lasting at least two weeks.
Disorders
Bipolar disorder
Episodes of mania or hypomania that may alternate with depressive episodes.
Disorders
Schizophrenia
Distorted reality — positive symptoms (hallucinations, delusions) and negative symptoms (flat affect, withdrawal).
Disorders
Dissociative disorders
Disruptions in memory, identity, or consciousness — includes dissociative amnesia and DID.
Disorders
Personality disorders
Enduring inflexible patterns deviating from cultural norms — borderline, antisocial, narcissistic.
Disorders
Psychodynamic therapy
Brings unconscious conflicts into awareness through free association, dream analysis, and transference.
Treatment
Humanistic (client-centered) therapy
Rogers's non-directive therapy using unconditional positive regard, empathy, and genuineness.
Treatment
Behavior therapy
Applies learning principles — systematic desensitization, exposure therapy, aversion therapy.
Treatment
CBT (cognitive-behavioral therapy)
Combines identifying/challenging distorted thoughts with behavior change — highly evidence-based.
Treatment
SSRIs
Block serotonin reuptake to increase serotonin activity — treat depression and anxiety.
Treatment
ECT
Electroconvulsive therapy — brief electrical currents inducing a seizure; used for severe treatment-resistant depression.
Treatment
Therapeutic alliance
Collaborative trusting relationship between therapist and client — strong predictor of success.
Treatment
Systematic desensitization
Behavior therapy for phobias — pairing relaxation with gradual exposure to a fear hierarchy.
Treatment
Big Idea 1
Stress affects body and mind through predictable biological pathways
Stressors trigger the fight-or-flight response (sympathetic activation) and Selye's general adaptation syndrome (alarm → resistance → exhaustion). Chronic stress in the exhaustion stage damages the immune system and cardiovascular health, making stress management a genuine medical issue.
StressGASHealth
Big Idea 2
Coping styles and social support shape health outcomes
Problem-focused coping directly addresses stressors; emotion-focused coping manages reactions. Social support, exercise, mindfulness, gratitude, and the tend-and-befriend response all measurably reduce stress-related harm. Positive psychology extends this by studying what helps people thrive.
CopingResilienceWell-being
Big Idea 3
Psychological disorders are defined by distress and impairment — not just difference
A behavior is disordered when it is atypical, dysfunctional, distressing, and culturally deviant. The biopsychosocial model and diathesis-stress model show that disorders typically have multiple interacting biological, psychological, and environmental causes — not a single explanation.
BiopsychosocialDiathesis-stressCriteria
Big Idea 4
The DSM-5-TR classifies major categories of disorder
Anxiety (GAD, panic, phobias), OCD, trauma/PTSD, depressive disorders, bipolar disorders, schizophrenia spectrum, dissociative disorders, and personality disorders each have specific diagnostic criteria. Classification aids treatment but raises concerns about labeling.
DSMAnxietySchizophrenia
Big Idea 5
Different therapies reflect different theories of disorder
Psychodynamic therapy explores unconscious conflict; humanistic therapy promotes growth; behavior therapy applies conditioning; CBT challenges distorted thinking and changes behavior. Each approach reflects its underlying theory — knowing the theory explains the technique.
CBTBehavior TherapyHumanistic
Big Idea 6
Biological treatments work alongside psychotherapy
SSRIs, antipsychotics, mood stabilizers, ECT, and TMS can all be effective, especially in combination with therapy. The therapeutic alliance — the quality of the therapist-client relationship — is one of the strongest predictors of success across all approaches.
SSRIsECTTherapeutic Alliance