Unit 4 VCE Psych Exam Potential Solutions 2011

Unit 4 VCE Psych Exam Potential Solutions 2011

SECTION A: MULTIPLE CHOICE

SECTION B – SHORT ANSWER QUESTIONS

Q1. Two Features of Adaptive Plasticity:

¡  Rerouting – neurons near damaged area that has lost connection with its neuron seek new active connections with healthy neurons

¡  Sprouting – new dendrites grow with more branches to make more connections.

Also:

– New connections between neurons (synapses) are formed or connections are altered (as a consequence of change to environmental conditions when learning something new, or when re-learning something after brain injury).

-  Other areas compensating for areas of damage

-  Occurs throughout life

Q2. One advantage of using a dimensional approach to classify mental disorders compared to the categorical approach:

Any one of the following would be appropriate:

·  Dimensional classification does not attempt to place people into discrete, diagnostic categories. Instead, key characteristics are identified upon which all persons can be placed, recognising that mental disorders lie on a continuum with mildly disturbed and normal behaviour, rather than being qualitatively distinct.

·  The dimensional approach is better able to capture many of the subtleties and complexities of person’s life that are missed within the categorical systems.

·  The dimensional approach evaluates symptoms not only on their presence, but also on their severity or degree. Categorical Approach only looks at presence or absence of the disorder.

·  The distinction between normal and abnormal is not absolute, but rather a zone where there can be a varying degree of the symptom or characteristic.

·  Dimensional approach is more nuanced and provides an accurate reflection of the state of a given characteristic or symptom in a person.

·  It allows sufferers to see improvement in their condition more readily and help to identify which factors have the largest impact on their well-being.

·  Dimensional Approach lessens the likelihood of labelling compared with Categorical Approach.

Q3a. Stella – overwhelmed by VCE (suffering sleep disturbances), Audrey – enjoying Year 12 (finding SACs challenging but manageable)…. In terms of Lazarus and Folkman’s Transactional Model of Stress and Coping - Why have Stella and Audrey evaluated their situations differently?

According to the Transactional Model of Stress, Stress is explained as a result of how a stressor is appraised and how a person evaluates his or her resources to cope with the stressor. It involves three elements:

a)  Primary Appraisal: Where an individual decides if a situation is possibly stressful, beneficial or irrelevant.

For Stella, her VCE appraised as threatening (as she is feeling overwhelmed and cannot sleep) and therefore stressed.

Or

Her VCE is appraised as a harm or loss that may not yet have occurred, but could occur in the future.

For Audrey, her VCE is manageable – she is appraising it as a challenge but she feels she has the resources available to deal with it.

b)  Secondary Appraisal: Where an individual takes into account the resources available to them – personal, environmental, social and cultural – and their own coping strategies to decide what way is best to cope with or address the stressor.

For Stella, she doesn’t perceive herself as having the resources available to cope with the stress and the anxiety the VCE is causing is leading to sleep disturbances during the term.

For Audrey, as she has the resources available she is able to apply problem focussed coping strategies to deal with the challenges she faces.

c)  Reappraisal: This outcome is then reappraised by the individual to determine its success or otherwise, and the coping strategy is suitable modified.

By improving coping skills or reappraising the stressor into a more positive light, Audrey would be able to avoid the negative stress response and the person can better cope with the challenge.

Q3b. How biofeedback could help Stella to reduce her level of stress.

Using biofeedback Stella can learn which physiological processes are contributing to her stress by bringing physiological changes to her attention through the use of sensors and other electrical instruments.

She would be given information about an autonomic physiological response that would indicate a level of stress:

-  She could use Electromyographic (EMG) Biofeedback to measure the amount of muscle tension present in a particular muscle group through a skin electrode.

-  Measurements of heart rate, breathing rate, body temperature, GSR using a biofeedback machine or polygraph.

Once a person knows when muscles associated with tension-related pain (e.g. muscles in the jaws, shoulders and scalp) are contracting or increased heart rate, breathing rate etc they can identify what emotions or thoughts cause it.

They can then either avoid the situations where this occurs or use muscle relaxation / cognitive strategies to relax the muscles and or other physiological responses.

This in turn would enable her to create a much more relaxed physical state prior to going to bed – which in turn would improve her sleeping patterns. Any changes in autonomic arousal could then be measured with a biofeedback device

  Biofeedback could be useful for Stella to learn how to recognise and control specific physiological responses to stressors in their lives – it is often used to relieve stress induced problems related to blood flow such as headaches or hypertension – triggered by the stress associated with doing her VCE.

Q4a. Outline the role of gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) in the medical management of Mikaela’s simple phobia of spiders.

GABA (gamma-amino butyric acid) is the major inhibitory neurotransmitter that makes presynaptic neurons less likely to fire in the brain.

• GABA inhibitory action counterbalances the excitatory action of glutamate (that makes presynaptic neurons more likely to fire).

• It is found in the CNS (brain and spinal cord).

-  People who have specific phobias like Mikaela may have reduced levels of GABA which normally inhibits the over-activated physical responses to fear/anxiety.

Taking medication that mimics the action of GABA in Mikaela’s system and inhibits the over-activation of physical responses to fear/anxiety caused by spiders.

For more detail see below:

Benzodiazepines: Drugs that are GABA agonists and may be used to manage or treat phobic anxiety.

phobic anxiety involving a highly aroused state (e.g. when a person with a specific phobia encounters their phobic stimulus, their sympathetic nervous system and HPA axis are activated resulting in a highly aroused physiological state);

• Benzodiazepines being GABA agonists (i.e. they mimic GABA’s inhibitory effects) and therefore reducing physiological arousal and promote relaxation;

• Benzodiazepines may therefore be successfully used to manage or treat phobic anxiety (e.g. someone with a fear of flying may take a benzodiazepine tablet before getting on a plane).

Valium is the best known example – it increases the strength of GABA Binding allowing the GABA to act for longer and more strongly in dampening the activity of the amygdala and HPA – thereby reducing anxiety and fear.

Q4b. State one socio-cultural factor that may have contributed to Mikaela’s developing of spiders.

Any of the following three options would be appropriate:

Specific Environmental Triggers: where something in the environment triggers the anxiety-fear response.

All Specific Phobias have a direct relationship to the person’s environment or their knowledge of it. Eg. A previous spider bite

Parental Modelling: where parental influences have shaped the development of anxiety disorders of their children, particularly relevant in social anxiety. Eg. Mother terrified of spiders

Vicarious Transmission of Threat Information: Where parental modelling has transmitted strong threat information from specific stimuli to their children. Often occurs for stimuli a parent has a phobic response with themselves.

-  Also occurs through other ‘gatekeepers’ including peers, friends, teachers and the media.

Eg. Media Stories about spiders, watching a horror film about spiders.

Q5. With reference to the three-phase model of operant conditioning, explain how a parent may reduce the frequency of a child’s tantrum’s:

Three Phase Model: Discriminative Stimulus, Resultant Behaviour, Consequence

Phase 1: Stimulus that precedes an operant Response (Discriminative Stimulus; Antecedent Condition)

Egs. Saying no to a chips, toys, lollies etc at the supermarket.

Putting the child to bed when they don’t want to go

(Anything that the child dislikes and that would lead (result) in a tantrum.

Phase 2: Operant response to the stimulus (BEHAVIOUR): The Child throws a tantrum.

Phase 3: Consequence: Parent ignores and walks away or removes a favourite toy or punishes the child…any action that will reduce the likelihood of the tantrum occurring again.

Once the desired behaviour has been learned a partial reinforcement schedule could be used, but to acquire the new behaviour a continuous schedule of reinforcement would be ideal.

Q6. John’s mother… What schedule of reinforcement is John’s mother using to encourage him to keep his room tidy?

Fixed Interval – Rewarded at the end of each week.

Based on this schedule when is John’s room likely to be most tidy?

At the end of each week, just before ‘inspection’. There is no point him having his room tidy before then as the desired behaviour is only reinforced at that specific ‘time’ each week.

Which reinforcement schedule could John’s mother use to encourage him to keep his room tidy all week?

A partial reinforcement schedule… Variable Ratio or Variable Interval

Why this schedule should result in more consistent tidiness…

John would never know which time of the day or day of the week (variable interval) his mother would inspect – so to get his extra money he would be likely to keep it tidy all of the time.

Alternatively, John would never know which clean up response would be rewarded with the allocation of the extra money (Variable ratio) – so to get his extra money he would clean up after each time he uses the room because he doesn’t know which response is going to be rewarded next.

Q7. With reference to Short-tailed shearwater bird scenario, identify one behaviour which is not dependent on learning and justify your answer.

“Approximately” two weeks later, the young birds leave their burrows and make their first migration to the northern hemisphere”. This quote indicates that the young birds do not have adult / experienced birds to guide them or teach them how to navigate to the northern hemisphere, they ‘just do it’. As all members of the species do the same behaviour and the fact that navigation of such an expansive distance is incredibly complex, the unlearned behaviour is not merely a reflex, it is a fixed action pattern.

Other options include:

-  Short tailed shearwater birds hatching in their burrows (dependent on maturation)

-  Adult birds leaving the baby birds (fixed action pattern)

-  Making an annual migration flight (fixed action pattern)

-  Young birds leave their burrows (dependent on maturation)

-  Baby birds make first migration flight (fixed action pattern)

-  Baby birds flying (dependent on maturation).

Q 8. Name an imaging technology which would enable a researcher to identify localised changes in the brain while learning a specific task.

Any of the following devices would be appropriate:

PET, SPECT & fMRI collect information about the activity occurring in the brain during a specific task, by measuring blood flow. This information is used to monitor changes in the location of activity in the brain and provides information about learning and plasticity.

fMRI: Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging: Structure & Function

PET = Positron Emission Tomography: Function

SPECT = Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography: Function

Command Term is ‘NAME’ so no explanation of how it works would be needed.

Q9. What is a Biopsychosocial Framework?

First devised by George Engel in 1977, The biopsychosocial model or framework (BPS) is a convenient way of understanding the multitude of factors that may contribute to the state of health of an individual. It is based on the idea that illness does not have a single cause but is based on the close interaction between biological, psychological and social factors affecting both physical and mental health and wellbeing in positive and negative ways. That everything within and around us affects our health and well-being in positive and negative ways.

According to the biopsychosocial model, diagnosis and treatment of illness not only focuses on the body but the whole person in his or her social context, and takes into account family and social support networks. The biopsychosocial clinician’s task is to develop a broader understanding of disease processes by assessing the interrelationships of multiple systems and working with the patient to choose appropriate interventions, knowing that all systems will then be further affected.

Explain how Biopsychosocial frameworks have changed the way health professionals consider health and wellbeing.

Traditional Western medicines focus on the biological aetiologies of physical and mental health disorders with treatments including medication. The Biopsychosocial framework has gone a long way to changing this approach. Practitioners now factor in cultural and other social factors as well as psychological factors in forming their diagnoses and in preparing best practice treatments. Examples of alternative treatments to drugs and medicines include cognitive behaviour therapies for changing fault cognitions and the use of social support networks as a tool in aiding recovery.

Other options include:

·  Previously, mental and physical health were considered as two separate concepts, the Biopsychosocial framework (BPS) unites these

·  The Biopsychosocial framework (BPS) considers the individual as a unique being influenced by the interaction of all three of these factors.

·  The BPS has caused thinking to progress from the medical model of health and wellbeing

·  The BPS has contributed to application of a functional model of health and wellbeing.