Schizophrenia
...activity, and abnormalities of brain chemicals that arise from environmental or genetic factors are also possible causes for getting schizophrenia. The disease is not caused by weak will power or results of bad parenting like some people may believe. The level of social and family support may be an influence of the course of the illness and be protective against relapse of the disease. There are several symptoms that could mean someone has schizophrenia. The disease usually gradually develops, but it can also appear very suddenly. Schizophrenia is not a split personality. People with schizophrenia may have perceptions about reality that are really much different from reality. There are positive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia. The positive symptoms are additional features of a person that are the result of the disorder. They are not seen in a healthy person. Some of the positive symptoms include delusions, hallucinations, agitation, and disorganized thinking. The negative symptoms are psychological features that most people have, but are lost in people with Schizophrenia. The negative symptoms include social withdrawal, apathy, lack of drive or initiative, and emotional unresponsiveness. People with schizophrenia may hear voices that comment on their behavior or tell them what to do. They may also have delusions that might make them think they are superior to others called delusions of grandeur. They may also have delusions that might make them think that they are being pursued by people, that people are against them, they have committed unpardonable sins, or that something does not exist in reality. People with schizophrenia also may have a lack of attention, a disinterest in life, a colorless speaking tone, a lack of emotions, disordered thought and information processing, an impaired ability to abstract, and an aberrant associating between thoughts and words. They have a decreased ability to function with social skills, speaking, and emotions. One type of schizophrenia is disorganized schizophrenia. People with this kind of schizophrenia are disorganized in their behavior and incoherent in their thought and speech. They either show inappropriate emotions or are emotionless. They may neglect their hygiene, personal appearance, and lose control of their bodily functions. They usually act silly and tend to speak nonsense. They may have unconnected or fragmented hallucinations or delusions and have a lacking of any consistent theme. Another type of schizophrenia is paranoid schizophrenia. People with this kind of schizophrenia have less strange behavior and disordered thoughts than people do with the other types of schizophrenia, but they may be afraid, confused, and agitated. People with paranoid schizophrenia often have frequent auditory hallucinations or delusions that all relate to a single theme. They may have delusions of jealousy, grandeur, or persecution. They might be convinced that the people around them are plotting against them. Another kind of schizophrenia is catatonic schizophrenia. People with this type of schizophrenia might hold uncomfortable and unusual body positions for a long period of time even after their legs and arms stiffen and swell. They might also have waxy flexibility and be molded into strange positions that they may hold for long periods of time. Disturbance of movement is the most common and well-known symptom of this kind of schizophrenia. An individual with catatonic schizophrenia may slow down their activity then switch to agitation suddenly. Another subtype of schizophrenia is undifferentiated schizophrenia. People are diagnosed with undifferentiated schizophrenia when they have hallucinations, hallucinations, delusions, disorganized speech, disorganized behavior, or flat affect, but they do not meet the criteria for the other types of schizophrenia. One more type of schizophrenia is residual schizophrenia. This is a type of schizophrenia that is characterized by a previous diagnosis of schizophrenia, but the individual no longer has any of the usual psychotic symptoms of schizophrenia such as hallucinations, delusions, catatonic behavior, and disorganized behavior. Sometimes there may be a few remaining symptoms of schizophrenia such as illogical thinking, emotional blunting, social withdrawal, or eccentric behavior. There is not a cure for schizophrenia, but treatment can reduce the relapse rate by fifty percent and significantly reduce the symptoms of the disease. There will be a better outcome the earlier that the schizophrenia is treated. Studies have shown that some people with schizophrenia may completely recover, and some may just be able to...