The Worried Well in Mental Health

Assignment Format: Argumentative Essay
Word limit: 2000 words
Special Note: PSYC30014 students should refer to the psychology student manuals provided on the LMS to familiarise themselves with the precise details of policies and procedures related to assignment word count penalties, late submission penalties, and extensions.
Essay Task
1. Discuss the following topic statement: “Those with anxiety disorders are really just the ‘worried well’.”
For purposes of the essay, use the following definition of the ‘worried well’ - individuals who may be eligible for a diagnosis but are not so functionally impaired that they are unable to work, participate in some social events, etc.
2. Your discussion of the topic statement should examine a minimum of 2 of the following issues:
a) The prevalence, reliability, and validity of an anxiety disorder diagnosis
b) Overlap of anxiety with trait characteristics like neuroticism
c) Treatment outcomes and efficacy for anxiety disorders.
d) Biomarkers and/or behavioural indicators of anxiety.
e) Contemporary models of psychopathology (e.g., Clinical Staging, HiTOP, RDoC).
3. Your essay must additionally include discussion and logical recommendations regarding useful future directions in addressing the issues that you choose to examine.
Advice on approaching this essay
In approaching this essay, you should develop a contention based on the literature that you research. This contention may be in overall support of the essay topic statement, or not. Your contention need not be polarised either way but may embody a more complex position based on consideration of points for and against the topic statement. Indeed, it is likely that your contention will comprise layers, such that: 1) an overall contention is presented based on consideration of all of the issues and evidence that you present throughout the essay; 2) your position regarding the topic statement as it pertains to each of the specific issues (see above) that you examine is also presented. Any overall position/positions on each issue examined you choose is fine, but your position must be based on evidence – the evidence that you will discuss in the body of your essay.
We strongly encourage you to take whatever position appeals to you the most based on your literature review and be clear about that position from the beginning. There are degrees of grey within the topic, so a good essay will likely not take an “Anxiety disorders DO NOT ever have overlap with the concept of the ‘worried well’” or “the idea of the ‘worried well’ is entirely unrelated to anxiety disorders” overall position. Better essays are likely to take any of the following overall positions:
• There may be some increase in desire for unnecessary treatment among those with anxiety disorders 

• Some individuals presenting with anxiety may merely exhibit elevated levels of worry or other symptoms that do not surpass a diagnostic threshold
• There is likely to be a class of individuals who comprise the worried well that has some overlap with and some independence from anxiety disorders
• Certain forms of anxiety may present in such a way so as to make overlap with the idea of the worried well more likely, though anyone meeting diagnostic criteria can hardly said to be “well”
• Some other nuanced position
The task for you is to work out your position for your whole paper. Be clear about your position from the beginning and use your essay to tease out, explore and support the position that you ultimately take (see above for examples).


Structurally, your essay should have an introduction, a body, and a concluding section. Following best writing practices, the introduction will contain your thesis statement (your main argument or position), the body will provide support for your thesis statement, and the conclusion will reiterate and summarise your thesis statement. Note, this does not mean that you should write the exact same thesis statement over and over again. Each paragraph should also follow this logical writing format and have its own objective within the context of the broader essay. In other words, each paragraph should be making a case for something and the sentences within that paragraph should be making that case and ultimately supporting your broader argument.
Given the size of the essay, your introduction may span more than one paragraph. The body of your essay should present arguments in support of and opposed to the topic statement and should have sections dedicated to each of core (again, see above) issues you examine. Discussion of the broad issues for consideration and the models you examine may occur within single paragraphs. In other words, you do not need to separately discuss issues and models. Instead, you should discuss issues and models together. Your concluding paragraph should summarise your essay, resolve the current state of the situation, and outline a logical future direction/s for addressing (or at least starting to address) the issues raised. There are of course, more than just these main points that you should build into your essay, and you should refer to the marking criteria presented below and essay writing resources available on the LMS for guidance here. Your first lab class will address the essay and you can also ask any questions you may have on the LMS discussion board.
Starting readings
The following readings are intended to provide you with a starting point from which to approach this essay. You do not need to read all of these readings, they are just suggestions to help you get started. These readings are available on the LMS. Additionally, Lab classes 1-2, and Lectures 1-3 and the associated readings will assist in formulating your initial approach. We expect that you will go beyond these resources in your research for this essay.
Conceptual Considerations of Psychiatric Disorders:
Kendler, K.S. (2016). The nature of psychiatric disorders. World Psychiatry, 15, 5-12.
Anxiety Disorders in General:
Craske, Stein, Eley, Milad, Holmes, Rapee, & Wittchen (2017). Anxiety Disorders. Nature Reviews Disease Primers, 3 (17024), 1-19.
Brown & Barlow (2009). A proposal for a dimensional classification system based on the shared features of the DSM-IV anxiety and mood disorders: Implications for assessment and treatment. Psychological Assessment, 21, 256-271.
Stein et al. (2014). Anxiety disorders, obsessive-compulsive and related disorders, trauma- and stressor-related disorders, and dissociative disorders in DSM-5. American Journal of Psychiatry, 171, 611-613.
Generalized Anxiety Disorder as a Specific Example:
Ruscio et al. (2017). Cross-sectional comparison of the epidemiology of DSM-5 Generalized Anxiety Disorder across the globe. JAMA Psychiatry, 74, 465-475.
Overlap with Related Characteristics:
Cuijpers et al. (2010). Economic costs of neuroticism: A population-based study. Archives of General Psychiatry, 67, 1086-1093.
Barlow et al. (2013). The nature, diagnosis, and treatment of neuroticism: Back to the future. Clinical Psychological Science, 2, 344-365.
The Worried Well:
Miller et al. (1988). The worried well: their identification and management. Journal of the Royal College of Physicians of London, 22, 158-165.
Brown et al. (2005). Are self-referrers just the worried well? A cross-sectional study of self-referrers to community psycho-educational stress and self-confidence workshops. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol, 40, 396-401.
Gray, Dineen, & Sidaway-Lee (2020). The worried well. British Journal of General Practice, 70, 84-85.
Marking Criteria
A. The ESSAY TITLE will (2%):
• Be an original title that clearly, accurately, and succinctly summarises the core topic of the essay
B. The ESSAY INTRODUCTION will (20%):
• Clearly introduce the topic area
• Establish the importance and relevance of the topic
• Provide a clear statement of the author’s position and how this is to be addressed throughout the essay
• Define key concepts at the point of their introduction
C. The ESSAY BODY section will (40%):
• Develop an argument to advance a particular position on the essay topic overall and in each area examined. This argument should be logically sound and supported well by theory and empirical literature.
• Present a balanced argument. The essay body should include discussion of both points for and against the topic regarding each area examined.
• Establish a foundation for recommendations regarding future directions.
D. The ESSAY CONCLUSION will (20%):
• Summarise the key points in the arguments and counterarguments.
• Resolve the discussion logically and with reference to the original contention.
• Make logical and useful recommendations for future directions in addressing the issues raised in the essay.
E. APA Style (8%)
• The overall document format, in-text citations and reference list should conform to current APA style (6th Ed.)
F. Writing style, gestalt, originality (10%)
• The writing style should be clear and concise. The rationale and arguments presented should be integrated coherently throughout the essay.
G. Academic Honesty (There is no specific % associated with this, but up to 10 points
can be lost for minor misconduct, more for major misconduct)
• Paraphrasing has been conducted appropriately and all sources have been acknowledged through citation and referencing.
Grade Range and Guide for Awarding Grades
Grade & Range Guide for awarding of grades.
H1 Meets all marking criteria. The assignment is clearly written and is well integrated. Essays in this grade band commonly demonstrate sophisticated evaluation of the existing literature and highly developed original thought.
H2A
(75-79) Does not adequately address all the marking criteria or the assignment is not as clearly written and as well integrated as would be expected for an H1.
H2B
(70-74) Does not adequately address many of the marking criteria or some of the marking criteria have not been met and the assignment is not as clearly written and as well integrated as would be expected for an H2A.
H3
(65-69)
Does not adequately address many of the marking criteria. The clarity of writing and the integration are poor.
Pass
(50-64) Does not adequately address most of the marking criteria. The clarity of writing and the integration are likely to be very poor.
N
(<50) Does not adequately address most of the marking criteria. The student probably displays fundamental misunderstandings, little original thought and minimal knowledge of the literature. It is likely that the writing is incoherent.