The next sign of schizophrenia and most infamous are the hallucinations. They are like delusions, except they affect the senses. The proper names for these hallucinations are as follows: visual hallucinations (seeing things that aren’t there); auditory hallucinations (hearing things or voices others cannot hear); tactile hallucinations (feeling things that other people can’t feel, or having something touching your skin that other people can’t feel); olfactory hallucinations (smelling things that other people cannot smell, or not smelling the same thing that other people do smell); and gustatory experiences (tasting things that aren’t there).
The third and fourth signs of schizophrenia are disorganized speech and grossly disorganized or catatonic behavior. A nickname for disorganized speech would be ‘word salad.’ The “grossly disorganized or catatonic behavior” is defined on “An abnormal condition variously characterized by stupor/inactivity, mania, and either rigidity or extreme flexibility of the limbs.”
The last symptom of schizophrenia is condensed into the large category known simply as negative symptoms. These all have to do with the social effects of the disease. It is divided into eight subcategories. The first three are lack of emotion, low energy, and lack of interest in life. All of these physical feelings are self-explanatory. These lead to depression. The fourth negative symptom is called affective flattening. Affective flattening is a blunted facial expression or less lively facial movements or physical movements (). Alogia is the fifth symptom. Alogia is “the inability to speak because of mental deficiency, mental confusion, or aphasia.” (). Inappropriate social skills, lack of interest to socialize with other people, and inability to make and keep friends, or not caring to have friends, are the sixth and seventh negative symptoms. The last of the negative symptoms is social isolation; the person spends most of the day alone or only with close family.
What causes schizophrenia? Researchers have varied hypotheses. Here are three of the top and most accepted theories.
Many believe that schizophrenia is related to genetics, however, just as many disagree. According to William A. Faustman, an associate professor at Stanford University and a clinical and research psychologist at Veterans Affair Palo Alto Health Care Systems,
“Technologies developed in recent years allow for genetic linkage studies, in which sophisticated laboratory techniques permits scientists to test whether the distribution of schizophrenia in families is related to specific locations on various human chromosomes. Some initial linkage to a location on chromosome 5 was reported, but unfortunately, researchers have not been able to repeat this finding. Other studies have also been unable to find a consistent genetic link for schizophrenia.” (Faustman).
This, simply put, means that scientists have only found one connection to a genetic problem, but have not been able to find it again. Here is a graph of the supposed odds of inheriting schizophrenia from a relative:
Further research shows a more in depth analysis of the supposed affected chromosomes when finding the disorder schizophrenia. The 22q12-q13 and 6p24-p22 chromosome is the chromosome that is supposedly corrupted. A 10% increase in the risk of schizophrenia has been observed with homozygosity1 for the Ser 9 allele of the D3 receptor gene. The 5HT2a receptor gene has also been implicated where schizophrenia came from().
Elyse Tanouye has a different hypothesis on how schizophrenia develops. She believes when growing into adulthood, specifically adolescence, is when schizophrenia arises. When you go from child to adult, your mind goes through, as Ms. Tanouye described it, spring-cleaning. The mind ‘disconnects and discards many little used circuits, or synapses2.’ It is a pruning of the brain. Tanouye talks of two theories. The first is that when the mind is ‘pruning’ itself, it is overly aggressive and destroys important information pathways. Her second theory is that the brain was already lacking in circuits, and the brain didn’t slow down standard ‘pruning’ conditions (Tanouye).
John Modrow is a schizophrenic, and authored the book How to Become a Schizophrenic: The Case Against Biological Technology. He believes that an abusive domestic life leads to schizophrenia. He lists disturbed family relationships, nobility marked through the family, and handicapped parents to be a common trait among schizophrenic patients. He stated, in his defense, that before Freud, people thought that all mental problems, such as depression, were caused by disease. As we know, this not the case. He believes that this chemical imbalance is caused by early childhood trauma, not by genetics (Modrow).
Through all these results, we find that none of the researchers described schizophrenia contagious. But what is it? Researchers have many theories. Here are the most common two.
The most accepted answer is “The Dopamine Hypothesis of Schizophrenia.” Dopamine3 is a neurotransmitter that is responsible for the biosynthesis4 of epinephrine5. In this hypothesis, researchers believe that an excess of dopamine in the striatum6 causes schizophrenia. The striatum connects to the cortex7, which is “the extensive outer layer of gray matter of the cerebral hemispheres, largely responsible for higher brain functions, including sensation, voluntary muscle movement, thought, reasoning, and memory.” (). Scientists support this theory by making a model for schizophrenia. They do this by analyzing amphetamine8 psychosis9, which has largely similar effects that schizophrenia has. The researchers found that only positive effects of schizophrenia were found due to the dopamine.
Another accepted idea is anatomical factors. According to NISAD (),
“There have been dramatic advances in neuroimaging10 technology that permit scientists to study brain structure and function in living individuals. Many studies of people with schizophrenia have found abnormalities in brain structure (for example, enlargement of the fluid-filled cavities called the ventricles11 in the interior of the brain, and decreased size of certain brain regions) or function (for example, decreased metabolic activity in certain brain regions). It should be emphasized that these abnormalities are quite subtle and are not characteristic of all people with schizophrenia, nor do they occur only in individuals with this illness. Microscopic studies of brain tissue after death have also shown small changes in distribution or number of brain cells in people with schizophrenia. It appears that many (but probably not all) of these changes are present before an individual becomes ill, and schizophrenia may be, in part, a disorder in development of the brain.” (NISAD).
This means that subtle differences in brain shape can be the cause of a major portion of schizophrenia.
An important question asked is, “can schizophrenia be cured?” The answer is: no, but it can be treated through medicines and psychotherapy.
Schizophrenia, as defined in Dictionary.com, is simply described as “any of several psychotic disorders characterized by distortions of reality and disturbances of thought and language and withdrawal from social contact.” As we have just found out, schizophrenia is much more than that. There are several symptoms of schizophrenia, including delusions, hallucinations, and lack of functioning in a social situation. We don’t know all the causes of schizophrenia yet, but the main theory is that it is genetically related. Schizophrenic patients are found all over the world, regardless of habitat, culture, race, or gender.
