Psychology^intro

Addiction A condition in which the body requires a drug in order to function without physical and psychological reactions to its absence; often the outcome of tolerance and dependence.

Aggression Behaviors that cause psychological or physical harm to another individual.

Agoraphobia An intense fear of being in public places or open spaces from which escape may be difficult or embarrassing. From the Latin fear of open markets.

Altruism Social behaviors a person carries out without considering his or her own safety or interests.

Alzheimer's disease A chronic brain disease characterized by gradual loss of memory, decrease in intellectual ability, and an eventual loss of personality

Analytic psychology A division of psychology that views the person as a constellation of compensatory internal forces in a dynamic balance

Anorexia nervosa An eating disorder in which an individual weighs less than 85 percent of her or his expected weight or natural Body Mass but still controls and limits eating because of a self-perception and intense fear of obesity.

Anxiety An intense emotional response caused by the preconscious recognition that a repressed conflict is about to emerge into consciousness. A feeling of impending doom.

Anxiety disorders Mental disorders marked by physiological arousal, feelings of tension, and intense fear without apparent reason. Symptoms include shallowed breathing, pale skin, clamminess.

Aversion therapy Using stimuli that elicit negative feelings along with a harmful stimuli to leave the negative impact in the user's memory so that they no longer entertain the harmful stimuli. For example, snapping a rubberband everytime the user smokes a cigarette.