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GLOSSARY OF
PSYCHIATRIC TERM
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References ]
- Affect
- The outward
manifestation of a persons feelings, tone or mood. Affect and emotions
are commonly used interchangeable.
- A range
of affect may be described as broad (normal), restricted (constricted),
blunted, or flat.
- Restricted
affect is characterized by a clear reduction in the expressive
range and intensity of effects.
- Blunted
affect is marked by a sever reduction in the intensity of affective
expression.
- Affect is
inappropriate when it is clearly discordant with the content of
the person's speech or ideation. In flat affect there is virtually
no effective expression; generally the voice is monotonous and the
face, immobile.
- Affect is
labile when it is characterized by repeated rapid, and abrupt shifts
- Agitation
- Excessive motor
activity, usually purposeless and associated with internal tension.
Examples: inability to sit still, pacing, wringing of hands, or pulling
of clothing.
- Akathisia
- Motor restlessness
ranging from a feeling of inner disquiet, often localized in the muscles,
to inability to sit still or lie quietly, a side effect of some antipsychotic
drugs.
- Akinesia
- A side effect
of the antipsychotic drugs characterized by a general lack of motor
movement in the patient, as well as a slowing down of speech and responsiveness.
- Ambivalence
- The coexistence
of contradictory emotions, attitudes, ideas, or desires with respect
to a particular person, object, or situation. Suggests psychopathology
only when present in an extreme form.
- Anhedonia
- Loss of interest
and/or pleasure in usual activities associated with depression.
- Anxiety
- Apprehension,
tension or uneasiness that stems from the anticipation of a danger,
whose source is largely unknown. Primarily of intrapsychic origin. (top)
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- Catatonia
- Immobility with
muscular rigidity or inflexibility and at times excitability most often
seen in schizophrenia.
- Circumstantiality
- In conversation,
the use of excessive and irrelevant detail in describing simple events,
the speaker eventually reaching his goal only after many digressions.
- Clang Association
- In thinking,
the association of words by sound rather than meaning, after resulting
in nonsensical rhymes and puns.
- Cognitive
- Refers to the
mental process of comprehension, judgement, memory, and reasoning, as
contrasted with emotional and volitional processes.
- Compulsion
- An insistent,
repetitive, intrusive and unwanted urge to perform an act that is contrary
to one's ordinary wishes and standard.
- Confabulation
- Fabrication
of facts or events in response to questions about events that are not
recalled because of memory impairment.
- Conflict
- A mental struggle
that arises from the simultaneous operation of opposing impulses, drives
external or internal demands (intra psychic when the conflict is between
internal forces - extra psychic when the conflict is between self and
the environment.
- Confusion
- Disturbed orientation
in respect to time, place or person.
- Countertransference
- The therapist's
partly unconscious or conscious emotional reactions to the patient.
(top)
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- Defense Mechanisms
- Patterns of
feelings, thoughts, or behaviors that arc relatively involuntary and
arise in response to perceptions of psychic danger to alleviate the
conflicts or stressors that give rise to anxiety. May be either maladaptive
or adaptive, depending on their severity, their inflexibility, arid
the context in which they occur. Some common defense mechanisms arc
compensation, conversion, denial, displacement, dissociation, intellectualization,
repression, projection, somatization, suppression, undoing, splitting,
idealization, reaction formation.
- Delirium
- A clouding of
consciousness, marked by reduced ability to focus on and sustain attention
to environmental stimuli. Usually of abrupt onset, the syndrome develops
over a short period of time with symptoms fluctuating in severity over
the course of a day. Perceptual disturbance, incoherent speech, sleep-wake
disturbance, emotional liability, disorientation and memory impairment
may be present. Condition is reversible except when followed by dementia
or death.
- Delirium
tremors
- An acute and
sometimes fatal brain disorder caused by total or partial withdrawal
from excessive alcohol intake. Usually develops in 24 to 96 hours after
cessation of drinking. Symptoms include fever, tremors, ataxia, and
sometimes convulsions, frightening illusions, delusions, and hallucinations.
- Delusion
- A firm, fixed
idea not amenable to rational explanation and maintained despite objective
evidence to the contrary. Some types of common delusions are delusions
of being controlled, delusions of grandeur, delusions or persecution
and somatic delusions.
- Dementia
- A deterioration
of intellectual abilities of sufficient severity to interfere with social
or occupational functioning. Dementia may follow a progressive, static,
or remitting course depending on the underlying etiology. Memory disturbance
is the most prominent symptom. In addition there is impairment of abstract
thinking, judgement, impulse control, and/or personality change.
- Depersonalization
- An alteration
in the perception or experience of the self so that the feelings of
one's own reality is temporarily lost; a sense of unreality.
- Dystonia
- Acute tonic
muscular spasms, often of the tongue, jaw, eyes. and neck but sometimes
of the whole body. Reactions may come on quickly and dramatically, A
treatable side effect of antipsychotic drugs. (top)
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- Echolalia
- Repetition (echoing)
of words or phrases of others.
- Echopraxia
- The pathological
repetition by imitation of the movements of another person.
- Flight of
Ideas
- A nearly continuous
flow or accelerated speech with abrupt changes from topic to topic,
usually based on understandable associations, distracting stimuli, or
plays on words.
- Grandiosity
- An inflated
appraisal of one's worth, power knowledge, importance, or identity.
- Hallucinations
- A sensory impression
in the absence of any external stimuli; can arise in respect to any
sensory modality - visual, auditory, olfactory, tactile or gustatory.
- Hypomania
- Abnormality
of mood but even normal euphoria and mania. Characterized by optimism,
pressure of speech and activity, and decreased need for sleep. Some
people have increased creativity while others demonstrate poor judgment
and irritability.
- Ideas of
influence
- The conviction
that one's behavior, including one's thoughts is being influenced in
some way by an external agency, when in fact it is not.
- Ideas of
reference
- The interpretation
of external events, especially the actions and statements of other people,
as having reference to one's self when in fact they do not. (top)
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- Loose Associations
- Thinking that
is overgeneralized, diffuse, and vague with only a tenuous connection
between one thought and the next.
- Mania
- A mood disorder
characterized by excessive elation, hyperactivity, agitation,- and accelerated
thinking and speaking - sometimes manifested as flight of ideas. Mania
is seen in major affective disorders and in some organic mental disorders.
- Mood
- A pervasive
and sustained emotion that in the extreme markedly colors one's perception
of the world. ' Examples of mood include depression, elation, and anger.
- Obsession
- A persistent,
unwanted idea or impulse that can not be eliminated by logic or reasoning.
(top)
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- Panic Attacks
- : Sudden onset
of intense apprehension, fearfulness, or terror - is accompanied by
physiological changes.
- Paranoid
Ideation
- Suspiciousness
or nondelusional belief that one is being harassed, persecuted, or unfairly
treated.
- Parkinson's
Syndrome
- A treatable
syndrome of side effects from antipsychotic medication which appear
after one or two weeks and that is characterized by resting tremor,
muscle rigidity, including a mask-like face; slow motor movement, and
a stooped, shuffling gait.
- Preservation
- The emission
of the same verbal or motor response again and again to varied stimuli,
despite the parson's effort to move on.
- Phobia
- An obsessive,
persistent, unrealistic intense fear of an object or situation.
- Posturing
- Maintaining
an unusual or awkward posture for a considerable amount of time.
- Poverty of
Thought
- Few verbal communications
or ones that convey little information because of vagueness, empty repetitions,
or stereotyped or obscure phrases.
- Pseudodementia
- Clinical features
resembling a dementia that are not due to organic brain dysfunction
or disease.
- Psychomotor
Agitation
- Excessive motor
activity associated with a feeling of inner tension, the activity is
usually non productive and repetitious.
- Psychomotor
Retardation
- Visible generalized
slowing down of physical reactions, movements, and speech.
- Psychosis
- A major mental
disorder of organic or emotional origin in which a person's ability
to think, respond emotionally, remember, communicate, interpret reality,
and behave appropriately is sufficiently impaired so as to interfere
grossly with the capacity to meet the ordinary demands of life. Often
characterized by regressive behavior, inappropriate mood, diminished
impulse control, and such abnormal mental content as delusions and hallucinations.
- Psychosomatic
- The constant
and inseparable interaction of the psyche (mind) and the soma (body).
Commonly used to refer to illnesses in which the manifestations are
primarily physical with at least a partial emotional etiology. (top)
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- Tangential
- In conversation,
digressions that divert the speaker from his goal, which he never reaches;
to be distinguished from circumstantial in which the goal is eventually
reached.
- Tardive Dyskinesia
- Literally 'late
appearing abnormal movements;' a variable complex of choreiform or athetoid
movements developing in patients exposed to antipsychotic drugs. Typical
movements include tongue-writhing or protrusion, chewing, lip-puckcring,
choreiform finger movements, toe and ankle movements, leg-jiggling,
or movements of neck, trunk, and pelvis.
- Thought Blocking
- A sudden obstruction
or interruption in the train of thought or speech, which the person
is unable to complete.
- Thought Broadcasting
- A symptom of
psychosis in which the patient believes that thoughts are broadcast
outside the head so that other persons can actually hear them.
- Thought insertion
- The patient's
belief that thoughts that are not the patient's own Can be inserted
into his mind.
- Thought Withdrawal
- An interruption
in the train of thought perceived by tile person as someone removing
or taking away his thoughts.
- Transference
- The unconscious
assignment to others of feelings and attitudes that were originally
associated with important figures (parents, siblings, etc.) in one's
early life. The transference may be negative or positive. (top)
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- 9C Staff
- A group of warm,
fun, innovative, and dedicated staff who are striving in a changing
environment to deliver the highest standards of care.
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References:
American Journal of Nursing/August 1981.
The American Psychiatric Association "Psychiatric Glossary"
HK/VJB/dk: 1 1/3/92
Glossary/8D Action Day
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