The article, “What is Schizophrenia?”, was written by Snyder Solomon, Kety Seymour and Michael Goldstein. The authors begin by introducing many factors thought to be the cause of schizophrenia. To ultimately choose to argue that the main cause of schizophrenia is the fluctuation of dopamine levels. The author believes this because of his research in the effectiveness of a specific neuroleptic, which involves the blocking of dopamine receptors. His research included the finding that many of the antipsychotic drugs have enzymes that block dopamine receptors which proved his theory. He also argues that no other receptor can cause schizophrenic effects because through his research he found that even when histamine, a-adrenergic and serotonin receptors were blocked there were no psychotic effects. …show more content…
A psychosis effect is produced when “amphetamine and related agents in large doses” (Snyder et al. 596) are administered to a person. This psychosis effect perfectly resembles the symptoms of acute paranoid schizophrenia in which a person would experience auditory hallucinations and delusions. With this being said “the problem with amphetamine psychosis as a model of schizophrenia is that it mimics only one subtype of the disorder” (596). Schizophrenia is known for its two symptoms being either positive or negative. The positive symptoms include disturbances that are added to someone’s personality such as hallucinations, disorganized behavior or delusions. Meanwhile a negative symptom would be the loss of certain capabilities one once knew such as social withdrawal, lack of drive or lack of enthusiasm. Due to amphetamine psychosis only exhibiting a subtype of schizophrenia, researchers have partially abandoned the relation between schizophrenia and amphetamine