Schizophrenia

Question 1

Schizophrenia

Answer 1

psychotic disorder, and profound disruption of basic psychological processes like distorted perception of reality, altered/blunted effect, and disturbances in thoughts, behaviors, and feelings

Question 2

What are the three categories of symptoms?

Answer 2

Positive Symptoms, Negative Symptoms, and Cognitive Symptoms

Question 3

Positive Symptoms (W)

Answer 3

-delusions (false personal beliefs), based on incorrect inferences about reality and examples are grandeur (thoughts of a higher self worth and identity), identity (think and believe you are someone else), guilt (overwhelming sense of emotion), and control (others are controlling you, and you have a voice in your head)
-hallucinations (false perceptions) without external touch and examples are auditory (most), vision, smell, and touch (least), and FMRI brain activity
-disorganized speech is disrupted and incoherent verbal communication and thinking and attention difficulties
-grossly disorganized behavior is inappropriate and ineffective and their are motor disturbances
-catatonic behavior is marked decrease/increase in movement and stupor or overactivity

Question 4

Negative Symptoms (M)

Answer 4

withdrawal (emotional/blunt/flat affect and social), avolition (lack of motivation), alogia (reduced verbal output and fluency), and poorer prognosis (different neurochemical or neuroanatomical)

Question 5

Cognitive Symptoms

Answer 5

disorganized/slow thinking, difficulty understanding, poor concentration, and poor memory

Question 6

Diagnosis and Prevalence Rates

Answer 6

you need 2 or more symptoms during a continuous period of at least 1 month with signs of the disorder persisting for at least 6 months. 0.5% to 1.2% diagnosis with it being slightly higher for males than females

Question 7

Age of Onset

Answer 7

normally between 16-25, however in males it is more 18-25 and females it is 25-30 and then again around 40

Question 8

Etiology

Answer 8

biological components like genetics and the neuroanatomy like structural differences (20-25% less grey matter for those who have the disease-frontal and temporal), brain activation level (lower activation levels leads to worse symptoms- mid-frontal cortex), however no evidence of lesions, there are also neurochemicals like dopamine being lower and that leads to symptoms of Parkinson’s also from the medicine, and finally their are environmental components like malnutrition in vitro, premature/low birth weight, viruses in vitro, and urban areas have a higher chance than rural areas