Hockenbury Discovering Psychology 5th txtbk

546 CHAPTER 13 Psychological Disordersmood disordersA category of mental disorders in which significantand persistent disruptions in moodor emotions cause impaired cognitive, behavioral,and physical functioning; alsocalled affective disorders.major depressionA mood disorder characterized by extremeand persistent feelings of despondency,worthlessness, and hopelessness, causingimpaired emotional, cognitive, behavioral,and physical functioning.seasonal affective disorder (SAD)A mood disorder in which episodes of depressiontypically occur during the fall andwinter and subside during the spring andsummerKurt Cobain As leader of the alternativerock band Nirvana, Kurt Cobain seemed tohave everything: fame, artistic recognition,wealth, and adulation from both fans andmusic critics. But Cobain also had a historyof troubling episodes of deep depressionand had attempted suicide several times.Like other people gripped by depression,Cobain focused on the negative during hisdark episodes. This negative outlook wassometimes reflected in his lyrics. Just beforethe release of In Utero, the group’s last album,Cobain pulled a song he had writtentitled “I Hate Myself and I Want to Die.”Not long after the release of that album,Cobain committed suicide by shooting himselfin the head with a shotgun. In his suicidenote, Cobain described himself as a“miserable, self-destructive death rocker.”Mood DisordersEmotions Gone AwryKey Theme• In mood disorders, including major depression and bipolar disorder, disturbedemotions cause psychological distress and impair daily functioning.Key Questions• What are the symptoms and course of major depression, dysthymic disorder,bipolar disorder, and cyclothymic disorder?• How prevalent are mood disorders?• What factors contribute to the development of mood disorders?Let’s face it, we all have our ups and downs. When things are going well, we feel cheerfuland optimistic. When events take a more negative turn, our mood can sour: Wefeel miserable and pessimistic. Either way, the intensity and duration of our moods areusually in proportion to the events going on in our lives. That’s completely normal.In mood disorders, however, emotions violate the criteria of normal moods. Inquality, intensity, and duration, a person’s emotional state does not seem to reflectwhat’s going on in his or her life. A person may feel a pervasive sadness despite thebest of circumstances. Or a person may be extremely energetic and overconfidentwith no apparent justification. These mood changes persist much longer than thenormal fluctuations in moods that we all experience.DSM-IV-TR formally defines a mood disorder as a serious, persistent disturbancein a person’s emotions that causes psychological discomfort, impairs the ability tofunction, or both. Mood disorders are also often called affective disorders. The word“affect” is synonymous with “emotion” or “feelings”. In this section, we’ll look atthe two most important mood disorders: major depression and bipolar disorder.Major DepressionMore Than Ordinary SadnessThe intense psychological pain of major depression is hard to convey to those whohave never experienced it. In his book Darkness Visible, best-selling author WilliamStyron (1990) described his struggle with major depression in this way:All sense of hope had vanished, along with the idea of a futurity; my brain, in thrall toits outlaw hormones, had become less an organ of thought than an instrument registering,minute by minute, varying degrees of its own suffering. The mornings themselveswere becoming bad now as I wandered about lethargic, following my syntheticsleep, but afternoons were still the worst, beginning at about three o’clock, when I’dfeel the horror, like some poisonous fogbank, roll in upon my mind, forcing me intobed. There I would lie for as long as six hours, stuporous and virtually paralyzed, gazingat the ceiling . . .The Symptoms of Major DepressionThe Styron passage gives you a feeling for how the symptoms of depression affectthe whole person—emotionally, cognitively, behaviorally, and physically. Take a fewminutes to study Figure 13.3, which summarizes the common symptoms of majordepression. Depression is also often accompanied by the physical symptoms of anxiety(Klein & others, 2008). Some depressed people experience a sense of physicalrestlessness or nervousness, demonstrated by fidgeting or aimless pacing.Suicide is always a potential risk in major depression. Thoughts become globallypessimistic and negative about the self, the world, and the future (Hammen &