Psychological Disorder

Psychological Disorder

One’s socialization along side one’s human development are influenced by one’s culture, predispositions, environment, and perceptions that all intertwine with each other.  Life is a journey allowing one to pass through many stages from birth to death.  The way one turns out is a direct reflection on how easily he or she made it through those stages.  How entwined human development and socialization is in a person’s life could spawn various psychological disorders.  How these disorders could arise will be discussed in this paper.  This paper will further analyze the affiliation between socialization and human development and its effects on anxiety development will also be examined.

Anxiety Disorders

“In the United States, 1-year prevalence for all anxiety disorders among adults ages 18 to 54 exceeds 16 percent”, (David Satcher, 2007).  The heartrending thought is that probably that number could almost be doubled if it were reported Because of the various anxiety disorders it can be said that there is not just one factor that contributes to the development of any one-anxiety disorder.  One can easily lay blame on genetics because it does play a major role in studies relating to offspring being diagnosed with the same disorder as his or her parents. It is also noted by (Hoehn-Saric, 1982), that a neurotransmitter called serotonin could be closely related to one’s anxiety level. This can also account for the deficiency of various chemicals that are created in the brain that could be the cause of anxiety disorders. (Hansell & Damour, 2008), state anxiety disorder is a learned response to stress thus triggered by one’s environment. A cognitive perspective could lie with wrongfully formed thoughts (Fiest & Feist, 2009).  There are five major anxiety disorders phobic disorder, panic disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, and posttraumatic stress disorder (Feldman, 2010).

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder

Posttraumatic stress disorder or PTSD occurs when a traumatic event occurs is supplemented with feelings of fear and helplessness.  PTSD is different from all of the other anxiety disorders because it is brought on by a life event.  Roughly 7-8% of the population will suffer from PTSD, 5.2 million adults have PTSD in a given year which the Department of Veterans Affairs states is a small number considering how many people suffer a traumatic event in a given year, and finally, women are twice as likely to develop PTSD over the male population (Department of Veterans Affairs, 2007).  The likely hood of suffering from PTSD stems from the origin of the traumatic event and the risk becomes increased with the number of times one experiences this event.  For example, if a young child was to witness or be involved in a traumatic event such as the sudden death of his or her father or mother, every funeral, or knowledge of the death of a family member could trigger those traumatized memories seared in his or her mind. Gender, education and other personal characteristics can lend aid to someone developing PTSD (Alloy, Riskind, & Manos, 2005).

Human Development and Socialization Affecting Anxiety

Socialization and human development go hand in hand, it is a staple in everyday life.  As much as the two influence life, they are dissimilar from each other.   Human development is the alteration of psychological, social and physical behavior where socialization is at tool with which one can identify himself or herself to a given culture through adaptation of values and behaviors.  (Shiraev & Levy, 2010) state that ones development and socialization are affected by both quality of life and way of living as well as expectations set forth by the society within their culture. Developing an anxiety disorder can be triggered by any one of these factors and can further explain why certain cultures and therefore individuals may develop certain disorders over other societies and cultures.  The Japanese culture for example, values others within their culture, which could lead to this culture having a higher risk for social phobias.  Greenland, on the other hand, has a large population of seal hunters.  Their fears would be from drowning thus leading to panic attacks.  These are just a couple of examples that support that ones attitude, one’s belief, and ones perception are influenced by the way he or she has grown up as well as how he or she lives with in their culture.  The occurrence of various anxiety disorders differ from culture to culture could be because “factors such as attitudes toward mental illness, stress levels, the nature of relationships within families, and the prevalence of poverty” (Kring, Davidson, Neale, & Johnson, 2007, p. 132), which play a role in how well a disorder is documented.

Conclusion

There are countless factors not just culture and environment that contribute to one’s outcome and what could trigger a disorder.  It is clear that socialization and human development do play a vital role in how someone acts in today’s life.  How he or she acknowledges others in his or her culture may explain why someone is more prone to develop an anxiety disorder over someone else.

Reference

Alloy, L., B., Riskind, J., H. & Manos, M., J (2005). Abnormal Perspectives. New York,             NY:The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc

David Satcher, M. P. (2007, January 18). Mental Health: A Report of the Surgeon General. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from Anxiety Disorders:             http://www.surgeongeneral.gov/library/mentalhealth/chapter4/sec2.html

Department of Veterans Affairs. (2007, July 5). United States Department of Veterans      Affairs. Retrieved from How common is PTSD:             http://www.ptsd.va.gov/public/pages/how-common-is-ptsd.asp

Feldman, R., S. (2010). Psychology and your life. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill     Companies, Inc.

Fiest, J., & Feist, G. J. (2009). Theories of Personality 7th Ed. . New York: McGraw-       Hill.

Hansell, J., & Damour, L. (2008). Abnormal Psychology Second Edition. Hoboken , NJ:    John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Hoehn-Saric, R. (1982). Neurotransmitters in anxiety. Arch Gen Psychiatry , 39 (6), 735-  42.

Kring, A. , Davidson, G., C., Neale, J., M. & Johnson, S., L. (2007). Abnormal Psychology (10th ed.). John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Shiraev, E., & Levy, D. (2010). Cross Culture Psychology 4ed. Boston, MA: Allyn and    Bacon.