Glossary of psychiatry

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A

• Abreaction – A therapeutic process of reliving repressed emotions and experiences to facilitate healing. Originally used by Sigmund Freud, who applied hypnosis to help patients release pent-up emotions through abreaction.

• Abulia – Also known as aboulia, this is a neurological condition marked by a diminished ability to act decisively or to make choices, ranging from mild to severe.

• Achromatopsia – A condition, either congenital or acquired, characterized by the inability to perceive colors. Complete achromatopsia results in seeing only in black, white, and shades of gray, while incomplete forms allow for limited color perception.

B

• Belle indifference – A term used to describe a paradoxical lack of concern or casual attitude toward one’s own symptoms, often seen in cases of conversion disorder.

C

• Catatonia – A psychomotor disturbance that includes a range of symptoms such as motor immobility, excessive motor activity, and resistance to instructions or passive movement.

• Circumstantial speech – A speech pattern where excessive detail and irrelevant information is provided, but the speaker eventually returns to the original point.

D

• Delusions of reference – When an individual believes that commonplace occurrences or mere coincidences have strong personal significance.

• Derealization – An alteration in the perception of the external world, making it seem unreal.

• Dissociation – A mental process of disconnecting from one’s thoughts, feelings, memories, or sense of identity.

E

• Echolalia – A condition where the patient repeats words or phrases spoken by others, often found in autism and certain other conditions.

• Euphoria – An intense state of pleasure or happiness, which can be a symptom of mania in bipolar disorder.

F

• Flight of ideas – A symptom of mania where thoughts race faster than they can be articulated.

• Folie à deux – Also known as shared psychotic disorder, this is a delusional disorder shared between two or more individuals.

G

• Ganser syndrome – A rare dissociative disorder characterized by nonsensical or wrong answers to questions or doing things incorrectly, sometimes associated with malingering.

H

• Hallucinations – Sensory experiences that appear real but are created by the mind, can occur in all five senses.

I

• Ideas of reference – The false belief that irrelevant occurrences or details in the world relate directly to oneself.

• Illusion – A misperception or misinterpretation of a real external stimulus.

J

• Jamais vu – A sense of unfamiliarity with a situation that a person recognizes in reality they've encountered before.

K

• Kleptomania – An impulse control disorder characterized by a recurrent urge to steal.

L

• Lability – Rapid and abrupt changes in emotional state.

• Logorrhea – Excessive and often incoherent talkativeness or wordiness, a common symptom of mania.

M

• Macropsia – A disorder in perception where objects are perceived larger than they actually are.

• Magical thinking – Believing that one's thoughts by themselves can bring about effects in the world or that thinking something corresponds with doing it.

N

• Negativism – An oppositional response to external stimuli or instructions, often seen in catatonia.

O

• Obsession – Persistent and intrusive thoughts, impulses, or images that cause distress or anxiety.

• Olfactory hallucination – Smelling odors that aren't actually present.

P

• Panic attacks – Sudden episodes of intense fear or anxiety and physical symptoms based on a perceived threat rather than imminent danger.

• Paranoid ideation – Suspicious thinking that includes beliefs of being followed, poisoned, or harassed without evidence.

Q

• Querulous paranoia – A delusional condition centered on imaginary grievances or disputes.

R

• Rapid cycling – In bipolar disorder, experiencing four or more episodes of mania or depression within a year.

S

• Somatization – The conversion of psychological distress into physical symptoms.

• Stereotypy – Continuous, purposeless movements, often repetitive, that serve no apparent function.

T

• Tangentiality – A communication disorder where the person goes off-topic and never returns to the central point, often seen in various psychoses.

U

• Unipolar depression – Depressive episodes without manic or hypomanic episodes.

V

• Visual hallucination – Seeing something that is not present or is distorted.

W

• Waxy flexibility – A condition in which a person’s arms or legs remain in the position they are placed in, often seen in catatonia.

X

• Xenophobia – An irrational fear or aversion to strangers or foreigners.

Y

• Yips – Sudden and unexplained loss of skills in experienced athletes.

Z

• Zeitstorung – Disturbance of temporal perception or time sense, which can be seen in depression and schizophrenia.

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