Schizophrenia is a long-term mental health condition, that includes distorted thoughts and hallucinations, can also cause the patient to feel frightened and paranoid. According to the NHS one in a 100 people Schizophrenia affects men and women equally and is often experienced by 1 in 100 people in their lifetime (Cox, 2001) with many living a normal life. It is usually diagnosed between the ages of 15 and 35 (Nhs.uk, 2014)
Schizophrenia is a thought process disorder characterised by disturbance to one’s perception sentiments and beliefs. Clinical characteristics are classified and divided into positive and negative symptoms. Positive symptoms individuals experience or sense something happening to them for example hallucinations (unreal perceptions), delusions (bizarre beliefs) or jumbled speech. Whereas with negative symptoms individuals do not show normal behaviour, diminution or loss of normal function, for example affective flattening, they could be withdrawn, alogia (poverty of speech) avolition lack of goal directed behaviour (Cardwell and Flanagan, 2012).
Diagnosis needs to be at least a month or two period of two or more positive symptoms (Cardwell and Flanagan, 2012).
However, evolutionary theory of schizophrenia could be a biological disorder deriving from distant ancestral human (Cardwell and Flanagan, 2012). In evolutionary psychology, one key concept has been the ‘the ‘environment of evolutionary adaptedness’ (EEA). Humans adapted to African savannah two to three million years ago; they would evolve, developing new traits in order to help them survive. They lived in tribes as hunters and gatherers. Food would sometimes be scarce and members would risk starvation.
Following this, a person developing schizop...
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...is that there are problems with cause and effect. Cognitive approaches do not explain the causes of cognitive shortfalls – where they originate from to start with. Another weakness is that it is reductionist, because t approach does not consider other factors such as genes. This suggests that the cognitive approach is oversimplistic when consider the explanation of schizophrenia.
Another strength is applicability because doctors use the cognitive approach and also this has generated further researches to improve therapy for example finding out the goal-directed navigation in a naturalistic virtual environment if it is a functionally meaningful measure of cognitive functioning in schizophrenia (Ronson, 2013).
A final strength is that it is not ethnocentric as the results could be biased to a particular group of people and might work differently in another culture.
Every year one hundred thousand young Americans are diagnosed with the disease schizophrenia (Carman Research). Schizophrenia is a brain disorder that is associated with unnatural behavior or thinking . The disease usually affects people during the late adolescence stage or early adulthood, typically during this time they develop the symptoms linked to the disease.
Mental illnesses are diseases that plague a being’s mind and corrupts one’s thoughts and feelings. Schizophrenia is one of the many disastrous illnesses that consume one’s life, is known as a real disease that deserves much attention. Experts believe that what causes the illness is a defect in the gene’s of the brain, and little signs of schizophrenia are shown until about one’s early adult years. Some effects of schizophrenia can either be negative or positive, but even if the effects could be either one, people should still be aware that there is something puzzling and alarming happening in the mind of a schizophrenic patient.
According to (Barlow, 2001), Schizophrenia is a psychological or mental disorder that makes the patient recognize real things and to have abnormal social behavior. Schizophrenia is characterized by symptoms such as confused thinking, hallucinations, false beliefs, demotivation, reduced social interaction and emotional expressions (Linkov, 2008). Diagnosis of this disorder is done through observation of patient’s behavior, and previously reported experiences (Mothersill, 2007). In this paper, therefore, my primary goal is to discuss Schizophrenia and how this condition is diagnosed and treated.
Schizophrenia is a disorder that affects about 1 in 100 people at different stages in their lives and is very difficult to diagnose. It has many symptoms that typically begin to appear around age 18-30 (2). Signs of Schizophrenia can be misread and sometimes overlooked due to the amount of other disorders that share many of the symptoms. Autism is one example. Symptoms can be classified into "negative" and "positive." Negative symptoms could be seen as those that are absent but should be present. Examples of negative symptoms include lack of motivation or apathy, blunted feelings, depression, and social withdrawal (1). Positive symptoms are those that should be present but are absent. Some examples of positive symptoms are hallucinations, delusions, thought disorder, and an altered sense of self (1). It is thought that hallucinations are the...
There are so many types of mental illnesses that affect people every day. When some people think of mental illnesses they think of the ones that would cause people to have physical symptoms as well, but that’s untrue, there are many more that you would never know anyone has if you were to see them on the street. As defined by the 2008 encyclopedia “a mental illness is any disease of the mind or brain that seriously affects a person’s ability or behavior. Symptoms of a mental illness may include extreme moods, such as excessive sadness or anxiety, or a decreased ability to think clearly or remember well.” A mentally ill person has severe symptoms that damage the person’s ability to function in everyday activities and situations. Every nation and every economic level can be affected by a mental illness. In the United States alone about 3% of the population has severe mental illness and to add to that number about 40% of people will experience a type of mental illness at least once in their lives. Some cases of mental illnesses can go away on their own, but some cases are so severe that they require professional treatment. There is so much more available to help people recover from their symptoms than in the past.
African Americans have a unique relationship with the clinical disorder schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is more frequently diagnosed among African Americans than white Americans or any other racial or ethnic minority in the United States (Neighbors, Trierweiler, Ford & Muroff 2003). The reasons for this are complex and not fully understood. Because of this there is a considerable suspicion and mistrust of psychological care within the black community. Clinicians should take particular precaution in the diagnosis and treatment of African Americans.
What is Schizophrenia? Schizophrenia is brain disorder that makes it hard to see the difference between reality and imagination, have normal emotional responses, and act normal in social situations. Schizophrenia is relatively young, it has only been around for less than 100 years. It was first discovered by Dr. Emile Kraeplin in 1887. He believed it was a mental illness. A few documents take Schizophrenia’s origins back to Egypt during the Pharaoh’s rule around 1550 B.C. People originally thought schizophrenia was simply madness, and usually associated it with madness, even though it is quite different from madness. Symptoms of this disease include Positive symptoms, which are: hallucinations, or things that someone can see, feel, smell, or hear that do not really exist. Many people hear voices inside their heads, see people that are not there, or smell odors no one else smells. Delusions are another symptom, also known as bizarre beliefs, these may include paranoid delusions also, which are delusions that tell the person that others are trying to hurt them. Thought Disorders are a symptom in which the person thinks unusually or dysfunctionally. Movement disorders may be present in schizophrenic people, they may seem like twitches or small, sharp, and sudden movements. Schizophrenia’s “negative symptoms” are harder to recognize. These include the flat affect, in which the persons face doesn’t move and the voice is droning. The lack of pleasure in life is another once, along with the lack of ability to start and sustain activities, and little speech. These symptoms prevent or block the person from living a normal life because they cause social, physical, and emotional, and mental problems. This may lead to psychosis, insanity, or ...
Schizophrenia is defined as a severe disabling mental illness. A person with this illness may be completely out of touch with what is going on around them. For example, the individual suffering from Schizophrenia may hear voices, see people who are not there (ghost in other words), and or feel bugs crawling on their skin when in actuality there are now. They may also have disorganized speech and behavior, physically rigid, emotionless, and delusions. The type of delusions where they believe that people are reading their minds, have control over their thoughts, and or plotting to hurt them. They have difficulty holding jobs and taking care of themselves.
Schizophrenia is a common disease; it is a serious disorder of the mind and bran but is actually very treatable it actually ranks in the top 10 causes of disability in developed countries worldwide. Schizophrenia is a completely brain based disorder, that causes hallucinations, and affects multiple brain functions, like the thinking clearly, managing how you feel, making decisions and how to relate to other people. People with schizophrenia also have to face illusions daily, which are very vivid false beliefs, which might cause them to think that people are following them or looking directly at them. Schizophrenia is a horrible disorder for the majority of people who face it, and very can also be enormously costly for families and even society in general. Even though it is treatable there is no current cure for schizophrenia the only thing now is that it must be managed through therapy. There are over fifteen modern medications for that could treat schizophrenia that were developed by different biotechnology and pharmaceutical businesses. The costs from schizophrenia was estimated to be in the range of $61.7 billion, and $22.6 billion direct health care costs in 2011. The most accepted theory of why people have schizophrenia is that it’s result of a simply genetics from the environmental exposures and stress during pregnancy or childhood are what generally causes the disorder to form. Researchers note several key strand genes that when damaged seem to create a pre problem or increase for the risk of schizophrenia. The genes, in mixture with known environmental exponentials are thought to be the reason that it is a result in schizophrenia. The genes that are projected to enhance the risk of obtaining schizophrenia are the Dysbin...
Schizophrenia can be described by a wide-ranging spectrum of emotional and cognitive dysfunctions. These can include hallucinations, delusions, disorganized speech and behavior, as well as inappropriate emotions. Consequently, this disease can affect people from all walks of life. Since schizophrenia is such a complex disorder it can ultimately affect a person’s entire existence and their struggle to function daily. With a chronic disease like this, most people have a difficult time functioning in society. This can make it hard for someone who is schizophrenic to relate to others as well as maintain significant relationships. Life expectancy for those who suffer this illness tend to be shorter than average. This is due to the higher rate of accident and suicide. The symptoms of schizophrenia can be broken down into different categories: positive, negative and disorganized. Positive symptoms include hallucinations and delusions. These tend to be the more obvious signs of psychosis. On the other hand negative symptoms indicate deficits or absence of normal behavior which can affect sp...
According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, schizophrenia is characterized by the development of two or more symptoms in a one-month period. At least one of the two symptoms must be delusions, hallucinations, or disorganized speech. Schizophrenia has always been a disorder shrouded in mystery. There have been many hypotheses from varying perspectives offering up causation for it and some have research, while some lack support. It is important when trying to comprehend and appreciate the disorder that its history is taken into consideration. This way the full extinct to which each branch of the disorder has developed can be absolutely understood. Learning from the past is the only way to proceed towards the future. With schizophrenia, it starts in the dark and works it ways towards the light.
Scientists believe that an imbalance in the chemical reactions in the brain involving the neurotransmitters may play a role in the development schizophrenia. The brains of people with schizophrenia also show small differences such as enlarged ventricles, less gray matter, and some areas may have less or more brain activity.
Schizophrenia is a group of psychotic disorders with major impairments in thought, emotion, and behavior; there is a constant prevalence rate of one percent with the occurrence being slightly higher in men. Though different psychologists have various theories on whether the disorder is linked to genetics or social economic status, schizophrenia in all
According to the Johns Hopkins Medicine Website , schizophrenia is “a mental illness that usually strikes in late adolescence or early adulthood, but can strike at any time in life” that is characterized by “delusions, hallucinations, bizarre behavior, [and] disorganized speech” among other symptoms. Schizophrenia is, at its core, the altering of a person’s perception of reality by some somatic means and when observed by a psychologically sound individual, can be quite unsettling. After all, seeing a person whose reality is fractured causes us to doubt our own reality, if only in a fleeting thought.
Mental health refers to the state of individuals psychologically, emotionally and socially. Mental health affects a person’s emotions, feelings, thoughts, and sections when exposed to different situations. Furthermore, mental health is responsible for a person’s reaction to stress and other social conditions. Generally, mental health affects how a person relates to others and their ability to understand and interact with them. Therefore, problems that affect a person’s mental health affect the abilities to socialize, their feelings, moods, reaction to situations. The person experiencing mental health problem may portray different behaviors when confronted with different issues. Mental health issues have several