Biological And Environmental Causes Of Schizophrenia

(Myers, 2014) First and foremost, schizophrenia is defined as “a group of severe disorders characterized by disorganized and delusional thinking, disturbed perceptions, and inappropriate emotions and behaviors”. In this essay, I will be discussing the diagnosis itself, the biological and environmental causes of the disorder, and two treatment methods for the disorder. Like every psychological disorder, schizophrenia has symptoms of its own such as: disorganized thinking, disturbed perceptions, and inappropriate emotions and actions. Understanding schizophrenia is important because it will help the patients deal with it and help others be knowledgeable to be able to help the ones suffering from it. Dealing with certain symptoms, as you can

(Myers, 2014). This is explained perfectly in the text, “Delusions are false beliefs. Hallucinations are false perceptions-sensory experiences without sensory stimulation… may see, feel, taste, or smell things that are not there. Most often, however, the hallucinations are sounds, often voices making insulting remarks or giving orders”. That is when they actually do hear voices because they are hallucinating by this disturbed perception concept. It is usually terrifying for the patient because as stated in the book by an actual schizophrenic, “…was like I was walking through a dream but everything around me was real. At times, today’s world seems so boring and I wonder if I would like to step back into the schizophrenic dream, but then I remember all the scary and horrifying experiences”. I can imagine it would be very frightening to have this disorder and not be sure whether you like reality or the dream better. When a dream is a nightmare and reality is scary, I don’t think I would want to live with this disorder. I remember watching a documentary on what it is like to be a schizophrenic inside of a patient’s head and it was quite unappealing. Everyday actions seemed very hard because of the voices in their heads that they cannot control. Also, they could not distinguish that from reality so it made it even harder to see the world the way we do. I would like to understand why and how schizophrenics feel and hear

It usually happens in the prenatal environment. (Myers, 2014) “Risk factors for schizophrenia include low birth weight, maternal diabetes, older paternal age, and oxygen deprivation during delivery”, these are not set-to-stone causes but they are very common factors to look at when diagnosing schizophrenia. There are genetic influences that suggest schizophrenia is very real: (Myers, 2014) “For most people, the odds of being diagnosed with schizophrenia are nearly 1 in 100. For those who have a sibling or parent with the disorder, the odds increase to about 1 in 10. And if the affected sibling is an identical twin, the odds are close to 1 in 2”. As most disorders, schizophrenia is definitely genetic and can be caused by environmental factors as well. “…environmental factors such as viral infections, nutritional deprivation, and maternal stress can ‘turn on’ the genes that put some of us at higher risk for this disorder,” independent disorders like PTSD, OCD, and Schizophrenia can be caused by anything, but fortunately, there is hope for schizophrenia: