When we, the authors, decided to write this textbook, we wanted to create something different for our students. We wanted to create a book that appealed to students by helping them understand that symptoms of psychological problems occur in many people in different ways. We wanted to avoid characterizing mental disorders from a “yes–no” or “us–them” perspective and focus instead on how such problems affect many people to varying degrees in their everyday lives. In essence, we wanted to illustrate how abnormal psychology was really about the struggles that all of us face in our lives to some extent. We represent this approach in our title: Abnormal Psychology and Life. Abnormal psychology is one of the most popular courses on college campuses. Students are eager to learn about unusual behavior and how such behavior can be explained. Many students who take an abnormal psychology course crave a scienti c perspective that can help prepare them well for graduate school and beyond. Other students take an abnormal psychology course because they are curious about themselves or people they know and thus seek application and relevance of the course information to their daily lives. Our book is designed to appeal to both types of students. The material in the book re ects stateof-the-art thinking and research regarding mental disorders but also emphasizes several key themes that increase personal relevance. These themes include a dimensional and integrative perspective, a consumer-oriented perspective, and emphases on prevention and cultural diversity. Personal relevance is also achieved by providing information to reduce the stigma of mental disorder; by illustrating comprehensive models of mental disorder that include biological, psychological, and other risk factors; and by employing various pedagogical aids, visually appealing material, and technological utilities.
A Dimensional and Integrative Perspective A focus on how abnormal psychology is a key part of life comes about in this book in different ways. One main way is our focus on a dimensional perspective toward mental disorder. We believe that thoughts, feelings, and behaviors associated with mental disorders are present, to some degree, in all of us. Everyone experiences some level of anxiety, sadness, odd physical symptoms, worry about sexual behavior, and memory problems from time to time, for example. Throughout our chapters we vividly illustrate how different mental disorders can be seen along a continuum of normal, mild, moderate, severe, and very severe emotions, thoughts, and behaviors. We also provide examples along this continuum that parallel common scenarios people face, such as interactions with others and job interviews. Our dimensional perspective is discussed within the context of an integrative perspective that includes an extensive discussion of risk and protective factors for various mental disorders. Such factors include biological (e.g., genetic, neurochemical, brain changes), personality, psychological (e.g., cognitive, learning, trauma), interpersonal, family, cultural, evolutionary, and other domains. We emphasize a diathesis-stress model and provide sections that integrate risk factors to present comprehensive models of various mental disorders.
We also provide an appendix of medical conditions with contributing psychological factors that includes a biopsychosocial perspective to explain the interplay of physical symptoms with stress and other key contributing variables A Consumer-Oriented Perspective Our book is also designed to recognize the fact that today’s student is very consumer-oriented. Students expect textbooks to be relevant to their own lives and to deliver information about diagnostic criteria, epidemiological data, brain changes, and assessment instruments in visually appealing and technologically sophisticated ways. This textbook adopts a consumer approach in several ways. The chapters in this book contain suggestions for those who are concerned that they or someone they know may have symptoms of a speci c mental disorder. These suggestions also come with key questions one could ask to determine whether a problem may be evident. In addition, much of our material is geared toward a consumer approach. In our discussion of neurocognitive disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease, for example, we outline questions one could ask when considering placing a parent in a nursing home. The consumer orientation of this book is also prominent in the last chapter when we discuss topics such as becoming a mental health professional, becoming a client in therapy, treatments available at the community level such as self-help groups, and how to judge a research article, among other topics. Throughout our chapters, we also focus special attention on issues of gender, ethnicity, law and ethics, and violence in separate boxes. In addition, we have separate sections that speci cally address symptoms of mental disorder in college students. We offer visually appealing examples of a dimensional model for each major mental disorder, brain gures, and engaging tables and charts to more easily convey important information. The book is also linked to many technological resources and contains 15 chapters, which ts nicely into a typical 15-week semester. We also include several pedagogical aids to assist students during their learning process. The chapters are organized in a
