A Review of Stress Reactivity Research in Relation to Psychopathology and Psychopathic Behaviour Disorders

Abstract

In a series of papers concerned with the problems of repeated psychopathic and delinquent behaviour, use has been made of a loose theory which interprets the social behaviour or habit as being a particular learned response to stress, anxiety or emotional disturbance, or to stressor stimuli not necessarily activating physiological stress (190-200). This theoretical position was adopted on account of its relative simplicity, its similarity to many clinical theories, and its ease of access for laboratory and operational studies. In a mainly adult hospital setting, the area chosen for research has been the differentiation of stable and unstable patients, the determination of methods which allow for accurate prognosis of future stability or instability and the form which future instability might take. The objective also contains the assumption that an explanation of instability should be in a form which permits therapeutic endeavour or at least indicates some basic principles for therapy to adopt, and utilizes variables which change as the patient changes.