Characteristics of SZ

• Schizphrenia is a long term mental condition involving a loss of contact with reality, a breakdown in the relation between thought, emotion, and behaviour, leading to faulty perception
• Diagnosis of SZ is usualy made through the Diagnostic Statistical Manual, the DSM states that the individual needs to display 2 or more symptoms for a month or have 1 severe outburst to be diagnosed
• Different types of SZ:

  Paranoid

  Disorganised

  Catatonic
• Paranoid Schizophrenia

  Delusions and hallucinations are present but thought disorder, disorganized behaviour and affective flattening are not
• Disorganized Schizophrenia

  Disorganized speach and behaviour are present along with affective flattening
• Catatonic Schizophrenia

  Promenant psychomotor disturbances are present
• Development of Schizophrenia

  Reactive Stage - withdrawn, eccentric, flat or unproductive

  Active Stage - symptoms appear, can last months - lifetime

  Residual Stage - returns to reactive stage after treatment
• Alogia - Poverty of speech

  Avolition - unconcerened with surroundings

  Affective flattening - lack of emotion
• Positive schizophrenia symptoms reflect an excess of normal functioning whereas negative symptoms reflect a loss of normal functioning