Category: P

A term for inaccuracies in judgment and perception, particularly in interpersonal relationships, based on the observer’s need to perceive subjects and relationships in accordance with a pattern set by earlier experience. Parataxic distortions develop as a defense against anxiety. According to Harry Stack Sullivan, a hypothesis consisting of an unconscious misrepresentation of reality in childhood…

One of two major subgroups of sleep disorders (dyssomnias are the other major subgroup). Parasomnias are disorders characterized by abnormal behavioral or physiological events occurring in association with sleep, specific sleep stages, or sleep-wake transitions. In dsm-iv-tr, this group includes nightmare disorder, sleep terror disorder, and sleepwalking disorder. A term that refers to a wide…

The study of sensory and motor phenomena shown by some human beings (and some animals) that are posited to occur without the mediation of the known sensory and motor organs. The data of parapsychology are not accounted for by the tenets of conventional science. The study of effects of the mind which appear not to…

A faulty act, blunder, or lapse of memory such as a slip of the tongue or misplacement of an article. According to freud, these acts are caused by unconscious motives.  

One of the major groups of sexual disorders; in dsm-ivtr, this group includes exhibitionism, fetishism, frotteurism, pedophilia, sexual masochism, sexual sadism, transvestic fetishism, voyeurism, and paraphilia not otherwise specified (including klismaphilia and necrophilia). The paraphilias (also called perversions or sexual deviations) are recurrent, intense sexual urges and sexually arousing fantasies that involve nonhuman objects, children…

A notable feature of aphasia in which one loses the ability to speak correctly, substitutes one word for another, and changes words and sentences in an inappropriate way. Three types of paraphasia have been described: a) Literal/Phonological Paraphasia: More than half of the intended word is produced correctly. For example, a patient may say “pun”…

Suspiciousness or a nondelusional belief that one is being harassed, persecuted, or unfairly treated.  

A lay term commonly used to describe an overly suspicious person. The technical use of the term refers to persons with paranoid ideation or to a type of schizophrenia or a class of disorders. Pervasive and long-standing suspiciousness and mistrust of others; hypersensitivity and scanning of the environment for clues that selectively validate prejudices, attitudes,…

A condition characterized by the gradual development of an intricate, complex, and elaborate system of thinking based on (and often proceeding logically from) misinterpretation of an actual event; it may meet criteria for a type of delusional disorder. Despite its often chronic course, this condition does not seem to interfere with other aspects of thinking…