Question

Outline the definitions of abnormal behavior discussed and compare and contrast these definitions in terms of their strengths and weaknesses. What definition of “abnormal behavior” do you think best captures the construct? Defend your answer. Using your preferred definition, how would you have labeled the activities portrayed in the “monkey brains”? use any of the other video clips shown in class to characterize the DSM 5 definition of what is considered to be a psychological disorder.

Answer 1

The textual definition of abnormal behavior is:

Abnormal behavior is a psychological dysfunction within an individual that is associated with distress or impairment in functioning and a response that is not typical or culturally expected.

On the other hand, it has another, academic-related definition:

Abnormal behaviors are behavioral, psychological, or biological dysfunctions that are unexpected in their cultural context, associated with present distress and impairment in functioning, or associated with increased risk of suffering, death, or impairment.

In addition, dysfunctionswas defined as behaviors or feelings that prevent a person from functioning in everyday life. They have distress as the behaviors or feelings that cause distress, and deviance as behaviors or feelings cause highly unusual emotions.

The strength to the textual definition of abnormal behavior is that it is universal. The definition may generally be applied to all people, regardless of culture.

In regards to the academic definition of abnormal behavior, its strengths are that it highlights what the dysfunctions are in abnormal behavior, what to look for, and when to search for abnormal behavior. It also provides a cultural context to its definition.

However, these definitions do have some weaknesses. For the textual definition, the explanation for what abnormal appears to be vague and does not go into much detail as the academic definition of abnormal behavior.

Additionally, the textual definition goes on to say that it is difficult to define normal and abnormal. In contrast, the academic definition of abnormal behavior does not address the fact that what may be viewed as normal in one culture may beviewed as abnormal or unusual in another culture.

I believe that the academic definition of abnormal behavior best captures the construct due to its attention to detail, as well as the fact that the academic slide from which it came from was taken from the DSM-V, and has thus been defined in order to best describe abnormal behaviors.

In my opinion, the “monkey brains” video shown in class can be seen as normal. Despite the fact that in the culture I grew up in, the behaviors in the “monkey brains” video would beconsidered abnormal; here, the cultural context needs to be taken into account.

Although one culture may view the “monkey brains” video as abnormal, the culture in which the “monkey brains” video takes place appears to perform this practice of beating a monkey and then eating its brain; it is also considred as a socially acceptable behavior and normal.behavior.