PSYCH 3B03 Chapter Notes - Chapter 6: Generalized Anxiety Disorder, Anxiety Disorder, Internalizing Disorder
Document Summary
Different disorders may actually just be different expressions of one or more general dispositions towards the development of internalizing difficulties. Culture may be one environmental aspect that influences difference. Anxiety: future-oriented emotion, characterized by perceptions of uncontrollability and unpredictability over potentially aversive events and a rapid shift in attention to the focus of potentially dangerous events or one"s own affective response to those events. Fear: a reaction to an immediate/present threat characterized by an alarm reaction. Anxiety and fear are viewed as a complex pattern of three types of reactions to a perceived threat: Worry: thoughts about possible negative outcomes that are intrusive and difficult to control. Children exhibit a large number of fears, worries, and anxieties. Most research suggests that more girls express fear that girls, though this might be due to differences in gender-role expectations. The number and intensity of fears decline with age. The changes in fears and worry reflect ongoing cognitive, social, and emotional development.