5.02: Abnormal behavior

• Introduction
• Learn
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• Task

Introduction

You only have to pick up a newspaper, flip through a magazine, surf the Internet, or sit through a movie to be exposed to some of the issues that psychologists deal with on a daily basis. Almost weekly, some celebrity is in the news because of a drug or alcohol problem, an eating disorder, or some other psychological difficulty. Bookstores are full of personal accounts of struggles with schizophrenia, depression, phobias, and panic attacks. Films such as A Beautiful Mind portray aspects of abnormal behavior with varying degrees of accuracy.

Then there are the tragic news stories of mothers who kill their children, in which problems with depression, schizophrenia, or postpartum difficulties seem to be implicated. The issues of abnormal psychology capture our interest, demand our attention, and trigger our concern. They also compel us to ask questions such as, what is normal, and what is abnormal?
Defining abnormal behavior and showing how it is different from normal behavior is difficult and controversial. A common definition of abnormal behavior is behavior that is personally disturbing or disabling, or culturally so deviant that others judge it as maladaptive, inappropriate, or unjustifiable.

Take a walk back through time and look at how far our thoughts and attitudes about what is normal have come.