Case Study Abnormal Psychology Essay

Abnormal behavior relates to the influence of psychological factors, biological factors as well as the social factors referring to inadequate relationships. In the face of diverse definition, abnormal behavior refers to the deviating from norm, which norm is the typical behavior or characteristic of the population. As such, Jim behavior is abnormal because it violates moral and conventional mores of the society (Violates societal standards), as such causing social discomfort to others. For instance, Jim fails to recognize the social cues in conversation thereby annoying other interlocutors. Jim is this case is behaving in a manner counterproductive to his own well being by abstaining from marrying and social relationships, which is maladaptive (Psychology facts, 2007). Jim behavior is statistically abnormal because he is notably poles apart from the society norm, his behavior has low score in the society distributed acceptable qualities DSM-IV refers to the â€Å"Diagnostic and statistical Manual of mental disorders. It defines mental disorder as a clinical considerable psychological or behavioral pattern that occurs in individuals and link with the current distress like painful symptom or disability, such as impairment of substantial sphere of functioning or with a significant risk of enhanced of possibility of suffering loss of liberty, death, pain, and disability. The syndrome is not a merely a culturally and expectable sanctioned rejoinder to a specific event. It needs to be presently presuming a manifestation of biological, behavioral, or psychological dysfunction within an individual. Nevertheless, there is no adequate definition on the precise boundaries for the notion of mental disorder (French, 2004). The definition encompasses the concept of the maladptiveness because the mental suffering of the individuals embrace maladaptive behavior by withdrawing from the family and friends interactions as well as well as eating that results in death as outlined in the DSM-IV mental disorder definition. Another abnormal element captured in the definition is suffering, by mental disorders individuals are at risk of suffering loss of liberty, and pain clearly borrows from the elements of abnormal behavior. According to the DSM-IV definition and description of the mental disorder, Jim is suffering from the mental disorder, within the category of â€Å"Axis II, which is personality and mental retardation. † This DSM-IV axis describes the enduring problems that unnoticed in the axis I disorders. The personality disorders occasion’s significant troubles in the way individual relates to world encompassing â€Å"historic personality disorder and anti-social personality disorder. † (Salters-Pedneault, 2008). In particular, DSM-IV defines personality disorder as the long-term prototype of behavior and inner experience with the following criteria: deviates from the individual’s cultural expectations (abnormal behavior), in this case Jim misses the requisite social cues in conversation. He leads a solitary life at age of the 48-year when he supposed to have family within the cultural mores. Additionally, Jim shuns requisite interpersonal relationships a fact, which run counter to the cultural expectations on human beings as social beings. Further, DSM insist that the personality disorder has to be inflexible and pervasive that on aspects of individual life and is not modifiable according to the situation. In addition, this disorder has its genesis in adolescence or early maturity and steady over time. The case study clearly indicates that Jim has maintained the behavior for like 15 years, and presence of his parents and brothers do not make him change his behavior gives weight to the criteria of the personality disorder as outlined in the DSM-IV manual compilation. The DSM-IV contains an axis system, which each of the axis represent a different category of the mental illness or a manner in which a particular mental illness may influence (Purse, 2009). In exemplar, key mental illness like, bipolar disorder ranks within Axis 1. The episode of the Jim portrayed in the case falls in the dimension of Axis II. The present edition of DSM-IV published in 1994, offers virtually 400 disorders (Crowe, 2000). The advantage of this is that it enhances diagnostic impartiality by adding decision trees demarcating significant characteristics of disorders, which makes clinicians by collections of questions concerning the presence or the absence of the symptoms. The present DSM-IV manual comprises of extensive anthology of information organized into portions for easier reference (Purse, 2009). The first section encompasses instructions on the way to use the tools contained in the DSM-IV, while following section contains comprehensive classification systems catalog of the official codes for each single diagnosis. The fourth section comprises of the manual detailing the diagnostic criteria accompanied by a description for each disorder. Despite the advantages highlighted above, there are some disadvantages in the manual compilation. First, the DSM-IV compilation lacks the exactitude in diagnostic criterion to evidently, differentiate one diagnosis from the other as well as the distinguishing mental disorder, from the situation, such as mental distress. DSM is not visibly clear on how experiences and behaviors cited within the diagnostic criterion justifiably can consider as substantiation of mental disorder as distinctive from rejoinders to life events (Crowe, 2000).