Schizophrenia

• Schizophrenia: A mental disorder characterized by disorganized thinking, speech, and behaviour.
• Positive symptoms: are symptoms that are in addition to the normal experience of life
• Negative symptoms: are symptoms that are less than the normal behaviour of life
• Cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT): is an evidence based psychological treatment approach that aims to change negative patterns of thought and behaviour
• Examples about positive symptoms are hallucinations, thought withdrawal, thought insertion, delusions and thought broadcasting
• Examples of negative symptoms are social withdrawal, flattening and poverty of speech
• hallucinations: sensory experiences that are not real but are perceived as real
• Thought Withdrawal: the delusion that thoughts have been taken out of the patient's mind
• thought Broadcasting: the delusion that others can hear one's thoughts
• delusions: false beliefs held with conviction despite contradictory evidence
• Thought insertion:  involves somehow experiencing one's own thoughts as someone else's
• Social withdrawal: Avoidance of social situations, such as school, work, or social events.
• Flattening: Reduced or absent expression in patients face
• Poverty of speech: you speak less often, use fewer words, take longer to talk or are less likely to talk unless someone talks to you first
• The genetic explanation of schizophrenia is that there is a genetic predisposition to schizophrenia, there are genes responsible for developing schizophrenia. The risk of developing schizophrenia increases if you have a family member with schizophrenia.
• The dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia suggests that schizophrenia is caused by too much dopamine in the brain.
• Social explanation of schizophrenia caused by factors like social class, urban living, immigration and minority status
• social causation is the view that human world acts as a major cause of schizophrenia.
• The glutamate hypothesis of schizophrenia suggests symptoms are caused by excessive glutamate release in the brain
• Biological treatments are used to treat mental illnesses such as depression and schizophrenia
• Biological treatments for schizophrenia include Anti-psychotic drugs, chloropromazine, and anti-depressants.
• CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) is a type of therapy that aims to change the way people think and behave and can be used to treat schizophrenia.
• Cognitive restructuring involves identifying negative thoughts and replacing them with more positive ones.