Final Outline

Madeline Tallman

Dr. Kerr

Eng 101 H Essay 1

September 13, 2010

Obsessions with Possessions

Thesis: In order to understand the reasoning behind hoarding, one must first understand what it is, who is affected, and the treatments used. 

1. What is it? 
1. Definition of Hoarding: excessive collection and retention of objects 
2. Hoarders usually have “aberrant psychological processes or brain activity
3. Prefrontal cortex controls collecting behavior
4. Patients with damage to right mesial prefrontal lobe experienced hoarding habits
5. Opinion 1- independent of OCD
6. Opinion 2- linked to many other social disorders like

1. Anorexia
2. OCD
3. Dementia
4. Psychosis
5. Depression

1. With depression, it can be used as an ironic way to “organize one’s life”
2. By itself, harder to classify
3. Blame on perfectionism to avoid embarrassment
1. Who is affected?
1. OCD is consistent from culture to culture
1. Culture promotes “minimal influence”
2. More research is needed, especially for collective v. Individualistic cultures
3. Different cultures have similar excuses
1. Object could gain value
2. Family member could care
3. Holds useful information
4. Suggested to be psychological rather than social attachment
5. More prevalent in older patients
1. Symptoms may start in childhood but not become life affecting until mid-30s
6. More common among adults who grew up in depression or had parents that few up in the depression
1. With lack of money then, everything was valuable, you’d never know when you might need something
2. Now, even if money is not as much an issue, those thought processes continue
7. Children of hoarders are more likely to learn the behavior from their parents
2. Treatment
1. Recognition of disorder might not happen until much, much later than initiated treatment
2. Patients use normal OCD medication- serrotonin reuptake inhibitors, only sometimes effective and not very much
3. Same criteria for men and women
4. Cognitive behavioral therapy
1. Hierarchy of importance of hoarded goods
5. Forced disposal can cause parent to hoard later
6. Reasons vary
1. Reason for hoarding is essential before treatment can begin
7. Work with hoarder’s reality, not one’s own
1. Forcing normal logic and hoping they’ll catch on can prevent progress
8. Figure out hoarder’s sense of value
9. Figure out hoarder’s perception of how others respond 
1. Hurt drastically if a gift is disposed of
10. Tend to feel self doubt
1. Afraid that if something isn’t written down, it never happened
2. Not to a delusional level
11. Watch hoarder’s behavior during treatment, don’t listen to what they say so much
1. Promises are easy to break
3. Conclusion