This document discusses generalized anxiety disorder (GAD). GAD is a common anxiety disorder characterized by excessive, uncontrollable worry about daily life events for at least six months. People with GAD may experience physical symptoms like restlessness, fatigue, difficulty sleeping, and increased heart rate. The document explores GAD from psychodynamic, humanistic, cognitive, and biological perspectives and their associated therapies, such as psychodynamic therapy focusing on childhood experiences, cognitive therapy challenging irrational thoughts, and biological therapy using medication.

2. We are celebrating World Mental health day

3. GENERALIZED ANXIETY
DISORDER
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4. Let’s find first What is Anxiety
 What is an Anxiety disorder?
 The anxiety disorders are the
most common, or frequently
occurring, mental disorders.

They encompass a group of
conditions that share extreme or
pathological anxiety as the
principle disturbance of mood or
emotional tone.
 Anxiety manifest as the
disturbance of mood, as well as of
thinking, behavior, and

5. Generalized Anxiety Disorder
 It is a common anxiety disorder that
involves chronic worrying,
nervousness, and tension
 *it is relatively common anxiety
problem that turns daily life into a state
of worry, anxiety and fear, and effects
daily works ,
 The anxiety that lasts 6 months is
coined Generalized Anxiety Disorder.
 In GAD, fear is not connected with
specific thing or situation.
 It makes normal life difficult and
relaxtation impossible
 It occurs more in women, with a sex ratio of
about 2 women to 1 man

6. People with GAD may
 Get worry little or no reason to worry.
 They are just anxious about getting
through the day.
 They thinks, things will always go badly.
 They worry excessively and uncontrollably
about daily life events and activities.
 They often experience uncontrollable
physical symptoms.

7.  Restlessness
 Easily fatigued  High breath
 Irritability  Startled response
 Difficulty in sleep/nightmares/  Moisture in palm
 Increase pulse rate
 Soreness
 Constipation
 Calmy hands
 Sweating
 Soreness
 Nausea
 swallowing  Dry mouth

8. Different Explnataions by
1)Psychodynamic perspective
2) Humanistic perspective
3) Cognitive perspective
4) Biological perspective
Let’s see what these perspective say about how
GAD occur and what are their therapies?

9. Acc: to Sigmund freud
Early developmental experience of person may produce an
unusually high level of anxiety when they showing their id
impulse and punished,child then believes that his id
impulses are very dangerous, and he may then experience
over whelming anxiety whenever he has such
impluses,Alternately child’s ego defense mechanism may
become too weak to cope with even normal anxiety levels.
They become over protected by parents from all
frustrations and threats, have little opportunity to develop
effective defense mechanism. This child when face the
pressures of adult life, his defense mechanism may be too
weak to cope the resulting anxiety and then this anxiety
develops into GAD.

10. Psychodynamic therapy
• Free association
• Therapist’s interpretations of
transference, resistance, and dreams.
• Object relation therapists( to help
anxious patients identify and settle the
childhood relationship problems)

11. Acc: to Carl Roger
When children fails to receive unconditional
positive regard and receive conditioned regard
so children become severely critical of
themselves and develop harsh standards, when
they try to meet Parents or others conditioned
regard by repeatedly distorting and denying their
true thoughts and experiences. resulting they
stop looking at themselves honestly and
acceptingly but repeatedly denying of their
thoughts, emotions and behavior. Despite this
self-judgment keep breaking through and

12. Humanistic therapy
Client-centered therapy:-
Try to show unconditional positive
regard for GAD person and to
emphasize them.
To this therapy GAD person identify
their true needs, thoughts and

13. According to Albert Ellis
Interpret the
situation as
Stressful dangerous
and
situation(like
threatening
exam)
to
experiences
Irrational fear
assumptions
(false
believes)

14. Meta cognitive theory
Acc: to Adrian Wells, the most problematic
assumptions at work in GAD are the
individual’s beliefs about worrying itself.
Worries further categorized as positive and
negative beliefs
Positive Beliefs:- people believe that
worrying is a useful way of appraising and
coping with threats in life and they at this

15. Negative beliefs:-
Society teaches them that worry
is bad, then individual come to
believe that their repeated
worrying is harmful.

16. Avoidance theory
Acc: to Thomas Borkovec, worry serves
positive function for individual.GAD
people have great bodily arousal
Borveck found that GAD people worry
repeatedly to reduce or avoid somatic
arousal

17. Cognitive therapy
1) Therapists help GAD person to change the
maladaptive assumptions and related
dysfunctional thinking
2) In other, therapists help GAD person to
understand that worrying may play in the disorder
and to change their views about and reactions to
worrying.
3) Rational-emotive therapy( more appropriate
assumptions and assigns homework to the GAD
person, that gives the individual practice at

18. Biological perspective
Inherited disorder also cause GAD,
Deprivation of neurotransmitter like GABA,
which stops neuron to stop firing, may
cause GAD, because continuously firing
of neurons produce anxiety which then
leads to great anxiety

19. Biological Therapy
Drugs like Benzodiazepine and
antidepressant drugs can relief GAD

20. “If you believe that feeling bad or worrying long enough will
change a past or future event, then you are residing on
another planet with a different reality system”
William James