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Diagnostic Tools for Mental Disorders
Diagnostic Tools for Mental Disorders
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Mental disorders are some of the common conditions across the globe as a large number of people are already affected. As a result, there is a need to diagnose individuals who have mental disorders so that they can be helped through treatment. Various diagnostic tools are used in the diagnosis of mental conditions. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) is a handbook widely used by clinicians and psychiatrists in the United States to diagnose psychiatric illnesses. There are various categories of DSM criteria ranging from DSM-1 – DSM-5. DSM-5 was published in the year 2013, a revision of the DSM-IV published in 2000. DSM-5 stipulates various key elements of a diagnosis. The diagnostic criteria and descriptor are among the key elements of a diagnosis and involve the guidelines for making a diagnosis. When the full criteria are met, clinicians can add the severity and the course specifiers to indicate the patient’s current presentation. However, if the full criteria are not met, the clinicians can use designators such as “Unspecified” or “Other specified.”
Another key element of DSM-5 is the existence of subtypes and specifiers. In this case, the subtypes are used to denote for “mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive phenomenological subgroupings within a diagnosis.” On the other hand, specifiers are not mutually exclusive or jointly exhaustive, and therefore, more than one specifier can be allocated. Principle diagnosis is another key element used when more than one diagnosis is provided for a person. The principal diagnosis is the basis for a visit in ambulatory care and a reason for admission, and therefore, it is the focus of treatment. The last key element of DSM-5 is the provisional diagnosis which is used in the event of inadequate information to help a mental health professional to make a definitive diagnosis, but there is a strong presumption that the full criteria will be met with additional information or time, then the provisional specifier can be used.
DSM-5 is not the only criteria used in the diagnosis of mental conditions. The International Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems 10th revision (ICD-10) is also used to diagnose psychiatric illnesses. The 43rd World Health Assembly endorsed ICD-10 in May 1990. According to WHO, ICD is the foundation for the identification of health trends and statistics across the globe. It is also the international standard for the reporting of disease and health conditions and is used for standard diagnostic classification for all clinical and research purposes. Chapter V of ICD-10 consists of a detailed classification of more than 300 mental and behavioral disorders. There are two main versions of ICD-10 that are available, and they include the Clinical Descriptions and Diagnostic Guidelines and the Diagnostic Criteria for Research. The Clinical Descriptions and Diagnostic Guidelines provide descriptions that detail the principal signs and symptoms of each of the conditions, along with other important but less specific features associated with the disorder. It also includes a comprehensive guideline for the diagnosis of the specific condition. The Diagnostic Criteria for Research, on the other hand, was intended to help the researchers of specific conditions to maximize the homogeneity of study groups, and it sets out the criteria that allow for the selection of persons with similar symptoms as well as other characteristics.
Another tool used for diagnosing mental health conditions is the Research Domain Criteria (RDoC), which an initiative of the United States National Institute of Mental Health. In contrast with the DSM criteria, the RDoC aims at being a biologically-valid framework to help in the understanding of mental disorders by creating a new kind of taxonomy for mental conditions and thus bring the power of modern research approaches in genetics, behavioral science and neuroscience to the problem of mental illness. Cultural competence refers to the ability to understand, communicate, and interact effectively with individuals across various cultures. Therefore, it involves being aware of a person’s world view and developing knowledge of the different cultural practices and world’s perceptions. Different cultures are vulnerable to various mental conditions, and thus, studying psychology helps individuals understand other cultures through cultural competence. We are able to appreciate the various issues that exist in a community due to the concept of inclusivity.
References
Harrigan, S. (2016). Diagnosing mental disorders: DSM-5 and ICD-10. Classroom Productions.
Critical Review of American Grace How Religion Divides and Unites Us by Robert Putnam and David Campbell
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Critical Review of American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us by Robert Putnam and David Campbell
Most people around the world refer to American religion as being a conundrum. Americans have for a long time tried to combine their ever expanding religious diversity with religious devotion. At the same time, they try and remain tolerant of each other’s religion. There is a need to know about the factors that have shaped the current United States religious landscape. Also, people need to know about the differences that exist between people who have no faith, those with faiths from non-main stream religions and those with faith from main-stream religions. Lastly, there is a need to know about the unique nature of America’s combination of tolerance, devotion and diversity.
The above questions have all been raised by Robert Putnam, a sociologist as well as public policy professor at Harvard University. Putnam is known globally because he effectively highlighted the American society in ‘Bowling Alone’. On the other hand, David Campbell is a Notre Dame University professor in political science. The two authors have come together to give answers concerning religion in the book ‘American Grace’. The authors have sort to provide an in-depth analysis and snapshot of the existing state of the contemporary religiosity in the United States. They have asked about the relation between politics and religion as well as that between civic and religion. They want to find out if religion unites people or has a divisive role as seen in the opening chapters of the book. Furthermore, they want to find out the path followed by America in order to be where it is today. American Grace has an ambitious breadth as well as a hefty dimension. It is clearly evident that the authors were targeting sociologists of religion to read this new kind of book.
The book has two extremely large surveys whereby the first had 3108 participants and the other had 1909 participants, in the years 2006 as well as 2007 respectively. The first survey had a sample that represented America and the participants were randomly selected. In the second survey, there were also quite a number of participants and they were asked similar questions as those in the first. The author seems to argue that it is quite possible to see how some changes are taking place in the church, such as attendance. Based upon the second survey, the authors were able to find out if having a friend who is another religion different from yours makes you warmer to their religion.
At the opening chapters of American Grace, a historical backdrop has been provided and it is not compelling to people who do not follow religious trends. It is evident that the authors believe that partisan politics has now become associated with the modern American religion and this was not the case almost a decade ago. This is because of what the authors claim is a two aftershock and earthquake event. During the 1960’s there was a cultural liberalization and the Time magazine even declared that God was dead. Thereafter, in the 1980’s and 1970’s an increase in religious conservatism was witnessed. The other aftershock came about in the 2000’s and 1990’s by children of religious conservatism parents and they did not have the same views as their parents, also, they were disaffiliated from any form of religion. They were mostly interested in enhancing their political views.
The current American society is polarized and this means that people who are extremely religious will most likely be conservative on issues that are hot-button. On the contrary, secularists most times tend to be people who are religious rebels. The polarizing trend has in turn given rise to religious ‘nones’ or people who do not associate themselves with any religion. Currently, they make up at least seventeen percent of the entire American population. These people are sometimes not the same as atheists because some of them claim that they believe in an afterlife and in God. At the same time, they do not have affiliations to a specific religion. Many authors have taken advantage of the fact that religion is highly polarized in order to come up with best-sellers. The authors do not even have any religious affiliations, but they want to be involved in the war that concerns culture and religion.
It should be known that there are some issues that have a correlation to religious beliefs such as pre-marital sex and sexual immorality. Most religious beliefs have no strong correlation with the topic on abortion. This means that people who believe that homosexuality and pre-marital sex are not right, are quite likely to be religious individuals. Therefore, such attitudes track the intensity of religion in a clean and clear manner. However, evidence shows that some religions are now accepting homosexuality and this is common among the youth who are religious. At the same time, abortion presents a problematic view especially among youth who follow secular values. The authors thus believe that the dividing lines will not be useful in the future especially when it comes to mobilizing secular and religious communities.
The ‘My Pal Al’ and ‘My Aunt Susan’ principles, suggest that there is a constant churn of the American religious life. It is no wonder that there are many interfaith friendships and marriages, as well as increasing conversions. This leads to higher and more tolerance of people from different faiths meaning that people who are not Christians have an opportunity of going to heaven. The authors emphasize that 13 percent of all Americans believe that there is only one religion that is true and the others are false. This figure should be known to people who often give pause to people that claim that religious belief does not have to be intolerant. For example, most Americans who are not religious tend to be regarded as being warm based on the provided thermometer. This means that people who are not believers are not popular to people who belong to a religious group.
In conclusion, Putnam and Campbell have suggested that religion has the ability to unite and divide people because of various reasons. Furthermore, their analysis of the American religious life as seen in the first four chapters is extremely impressive. Humanists and sociologists will gain better understanding of their different religious neighbors. They will also obtain hard data that concerns the beliefs of Americans as well as what they pray for upon reading this book. Indeed, religion is an issue that attracts the attention of people because it has many interpretations. Therefore, Americans needs to be tolerant of each other’s religion without offering criticism.
Work Cited
Putnam, Robert. & Campbell, David. American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us. Simon & Schuster, 2012. Print.
Diagnostic Assessment and Intervention Project
Diagnostic Assessment and Intervention Project
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Diagnostic Assessment and Intervention Project
Background
Benji, 10 years old has Spanish as his Native language at home but is also fluent in social English/ Spanish. Wed a chance to converse with the mother who didn’t seem to have any difficulty speaking English as well. At the initial stages of the interview, we had the necessary overview of who Benji is. He has autism, asthma and gets easily frustrated. His needs were written as comprehension and reading, language arts. His strengths and interests are playing sports and drawing. Through personal observation, I was able to establish that Benji is a very enthusiastic boy. He is quite talkative and joins the discussion during class time. He does have difficulty with writing or spelling and therefore prefers expressing her thoughts verbally than in writing. Since the classroom is discussion based and a lot of talking, it worked to his advantage by giving him more flexibility with doing his wok while still having fun and talking of what to write.
Preparation
For preparation purposes, I assembledthe necessary assessment materials for the phonologic student, these included word lists of various grades.
Administration of Assessment Battery
San Diego quick
The purpose of this test was to get a general measure of the overall reading ability of the student and to measure the ability to recognize words out of context, since proficient readers are usually accurate both in and out of context
This test involved 13 graded word lists obtained from preprimary to eleventh grade, words being of equal difficulty. Normally poor readers rely on context and recognize words in context easier than out of context.
The student read word lists of increasing difficulty until he reached a” frustration” level. Beginning with a list that is two or three grade level below the students current academic placement, I gave the student a test sheet and I told him there were a number of short word list on that page andI pointed to the list he was to begin with while reading each word aloud. Encouraged the student to try reading each and every word no matter how difficult it was.
In the event that the student paused before attempting to pronounce a word, I encouraged him to try but after five seconds I would tell him to move on to the next word. The student read successive lists and in any case he made fewer than three errors I would commend him.
CORE Phoneme Deletion Test
This test included four phoneme deletion tasks that were arranged in order of difficulty, first being asses the student’s ability to delete initial phonemes while the rest assessed the students ability to delete final phonemes such as /t/ in a word like seat.
The core phoneme deletion test was used as a screening measure, progress monitoring measure and a diagnostic measure, whereby it contained tasks that were expected to be mastered in grades k-3.
These tasks would help to determine whether deficits in phonemic, orsound, awareness account for the students reading or spelling delays.
Before I administered each task, I used practice items to teach the task, whereby I praised the student for even close approximation of the correct answers. However I only gave general feedback while administering the test items was keen not to correct errors, instead I consisted praised him for his willingness to participate. I subjected the student to several tests including initial sound (late kindergarten and grade one, final sound (grade 1), first sound of a consonant blend (grade 2), embedded sound of a consonant blend (grade 3) in that order. In the first test I gave two practice items;
I told the student to say aloud the word cat after which he would say it without the /k/ .If the student responded incorrectly I would repeat to him the word emphasizing the /k/ while artificially separating it from the at where necessary I would say each word slowly in a bid to help the student. We repeated the item until the student gave the correct response.
We repeated the process using the word table. When the responded to these two items we proceeded to task 2 whereby I told the student that we were going to play another word game whose rules were abit different therefore he was to pay close attention. We repeated the process in task 1 using the word seat until the student responded correctly and then proceeded to test 3.
I told him that we were to do something different so he would pay close attention. We repeated the previous process but this time the first sound of the consonant blend was to be silent in the practice item “slip”. When the student was able to respond to at least two of the test items we moved on to the last test part.As usual I told the student that we would play yet another word game with different rules we repeated the previous processes using the word play whereby he would say the word aloud and repeat without the /l/.After several incorrect responses he could respond to the practice item.
Core Phoneme Segmentation Test
This was done to test the ability of the student to break a word into component phonemes or sounds, and was also used as a screening measure, progress monitoring measure and a specific skills measure.It provided information regarding his response to instructions, and monitor delays in reading and spelling that could not be attributed to limited English or limited exposure to instructions, this was after giving test of comprehension, fluency and phonics.
Normally older students who are significantly behind in reading and spelling have underdeveloped phonemic awareness hence the test can be used to determine whether deficits in sound awareness would account for serious delays in reading or spelling.
I only proceeded to the test items after the student demonstrated understanding of the practice item tasks, while teaching, I consistently praised the student for close approximation of the correct answer, however while administering test items, I only gave general feedback. Neither did I correct errors nor praise correct answers but recorded the students exact response on the blank line the after administering each item I indicated whether the response was correct or not.
Under this test I subjected him to two practice items whereby laid out on the table eight blocks of assorted colors in a horizontal line from left to right. The block color was not important; however I used a different color block for each of the different sounds in the word putting the blocks back in the pile after he completed an item. I explained to him to show me the sounds in the word sit using different blocks for each sound i.e. /s/i/t/.
I gave him another item in which he would use the blocks to show the sounds in the word shop. Where he could not do the segmentation independently I did a demonstration and also reminded him to attend too sounds rather than letters until he could at least point to the block that represented the correct sound and then we would proceed.
CORE Graded High-Frequency word survey
This consisted of five word list that assessed his recognition of words occurring very frequently in text at each of grade k-4.The list took into account the changing frequency of particular words from grade to grade and reflected the high frequency words encountered by the students as they progressed through grades.
This survey was used as a screening measure and also as an outcome measure providing data at the end of an instructional period. This could whether or not he needed instruction in selected high frequency words at his grade level or if further assessment was needed.
High frequency words are crucial for comprehension; their automatic recognition affects the flow and coherence of texts and hence contributes to reading fluency.
Administration of the word list at his grade level was done to test specific skills I continuously monitored his progress to mastery, this included the student reading out words aloud where I would mark errors on the record form by crossing out missed words.
Administration of word list for each preceding grade was done until the student performed satisfactorily.
Assessment findings
Having assessed the student below is a summary of the findings in the four tests that I carried out. The student exhibited various phonological problems in the four tests carried out. These included syllable deletion, phoneme blending and syllable segmentation among others.
Using the San Diego quick assessment reading ability, he suffered consisted “frustration” due to difficulties in reading word lists; however I kept encouraging him to continue trying even in the event that he didn’t utter a word. The student’s response to instruction was not very impressive as the student could take time to respond to instruction given.
In fig.1, In the core phoneme deletion test, I found out that the deficit in phonemic and sound awareness did not account much for students reading and spelling delays, he seemed to respond well to most of the words in this word list except for a few in the final sound and the embedded sound of a consonant blend
In fig.2, CORE Graded High Frequency Word Survey
In this test he exhibited good ability in recognizing words with high frequency at all grade levels. the student seemed to experience difficulties in general coordination between hearing and speech, however he could respond correctly after I gave him more time to repeat the words he responded incorrectly.
(Attach image)
Fig.1
Fig.2
assessment Test Grade level expectations Score
Core phonemic awareness Phoneme segmentation test Bench mark 14-15
Strategic 11-13
Intensive 0-10 11/15 (strategic)
Phoneme deletion Bench mark 5
Intensive 0-4 5(bench mark)
1.phoneme deletion 2.final sound Bench mark 5
Intensive 0-4
4(bench mark)
3.first sound of a consonant blend Bench mark 5
Intensive 0-4 4(bench mark)
4.embedded sound of a consonant blend Bench mark 5
Strategic 4
Intensive 0-3
18
assessment
Overall reading ability test Grade level Score out of 10
San Diego quick Pre primer 10
Primer 10
Grade 1 10
Grade 2 9
Grade 3 6
Grade 4 8
Grade 5 7
Grade 6 5
Grade 7 Grade 8 Grade 9 Grade 10 Grade 11 assessment test List score
Ability to recognize high frequency words Core graded high frequency word survey List k 10 (bench mark)
List I 24 (bench mark)
List II 24 (bench mark)
List III 24 (bench mark)
List IV 24 (bench mark)