Glossary
Searchable terminology from accessibility, web standards, and related fields.
62 results found in mental health.
- Passive Sensing (Passive Monitoring, Ambient Sensing)
- The collection of behavioral and physiological data through sensors without requiring active user input. In mental health contexts, passive sensing uses smartphone sensors (GPS, accelerometer, microph…
- Perinatal depression (PND, Perinatal mood disorder)
- Perinatal depression (PND) refers to major depressive episodes that occur during pregnancy (antenatal depression) or in the weeks following childbirth (postpartum depression). It affects up to 10% of …
- Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
- A mental health condition that can develop after experiencing or witnessing a traumatic event such as violence, natural disaster, serious accident, or combat. Symptoms include intrusive memories or fl…
- Postpartum depression (Postnatal depression, PPD)
- Postpartum depression (PPD) is a form of clinical depression occurring after childbirth, typically within the first four to six weeks postpartum but potentially developing up to a year after delivery.…
- Psychoeducation
- The process of providing education about a mental health condition, its symptoms, treatment options, and management strategies to individuals with the condition and their support networks. For OCD, ps…
- Reassurance Seeking (Reassurance-Seeking Behavior)
- A compulsive behavior in OCD where individuals repeatedly seek confirmation from others (or from technology, such as internet searches) that feared outcomes have not occurred or will not occur. Reassu…
- Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria (RSD)
- An intense, disproportionate emotional response to perceived or actual rejection, criticism, or failure, commonly reported by people with ADHD and often linked to trauma from chronic social rejection …
- Resilience (Psychological resilience, Dementia resilience)
- Resilience refers to the dynamic capacity of an individual to adapt positively in the face of adversity and to maintain or recover a satisfactory level of psychological and functional well-being. In t…
- Responsibility OCD (Checking OCD, Responsibility Obsessions)
- A subtype of OCD characterized by an exaggerated sense of responsibility for preventing harm or negative outcomes, accompanied by compulsive checking behaviors. People with responsibility OCD may repe…
- Revenge Bedtime Procrastination (Revenge Procrastination)
- The deliberate delay of sleep without external factors forcing the delay, in order to reclaim personal time lost during a busy or low-autonomy day. The "revenge" framing points to reclaiming agency ov…
- Rumination (Mental Compulsion, Obsessive Rumination)
- A repetitive, often circular pattern of thinking in which a person dwells on distressing thoughts, questions, or scenarios without reaching resolution. In OCD, rumination is a covert mental compulsion…
- SUDS (Subjective Units of Distress Scale, Subjective Units of Disturbance Scale)
- A self-report scale, typically ranging from 0 to 100 or 0 to 10, used to measure the intensity of subjective distress or anxiety experienced by an individual in a given moment. SUDS ratings are widely…
- Social isolation (Loneliness, Social exclusion)
- A state of limited or absent social contact and meaningful relationships, recognized as a significant risk factor for poor physical and mental health outcomes, particularly among older adults and peop…
- Stress Process Model (Pearlin Stress Process Model)
- A theoretical framework developed by Leonard Pearlin and colleagues (1981) that describes how stressors, mediators, and outcomes interact dynamically over time to shape psychological wellbeing. In car…
- Symptom Tracking (Symptom Monitoring, Symptom Logging)
- The systematic recording of mental health symptoms, behaviors, triggers, and associated contexts over time to build self-awareness, identify patterns, and measure treatment progress. For OCD, symptom …
- Therapeutic Drift
- A phenomenon in AI-mediated support contexts in which users begin to treat an emotionally supportive AI system as a substitute for professional clinical care or meaningful human relationships, rather …
- Thought Diffusion (Cognitive Defusion, Defusion)
- A technique from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy in which a person creates psychological distance from an intrusive thought by recognizing and naming it as simply a thought, rather than treating it …
- Trauma-Informed Care (TIC, Trauma-Informed Approach)
- A framework originating in social work practice that asks organisations and service providers to recognise the widespread impact of trauma on the people they serve and to integrate that understanding …
- Trigger Avoidance (Avoidance Behavior, OCD Avoidance)
- A compulsive behavior pattern in OCD where individuals minimize or eliminate contact with situations, objects, people, or places that trigger their obsessions. Trigger avoidance ranges from subtle ada…
- Trigger Hierarchy (Exposure Hierarchy, Fear Hierarchy, Fear Ladder)
- A ranked list of situations, objects, or thoughts that trigger OCD anxiety, ordered from least to most distressing as measured by subjective distress ratings (SUDS). Trigger hierarchies are a foundati…