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Symptoms of Schizophrenia
By peace | November 12, 2005
Some of the typical signs are delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech, negative symptoms, and disorganized or catatonic behavior.
1. Delusions
Delusions are false beliefs that a person holds on to, despite the fact that there is strong evidence that the beliefs are wrong. People with delusions often believe that a person or a group of people is watching them and wants to hurt them.
Delusions are often based on real sensory experiences (experiences of the senses: vision, hearing, touch, taste, or smell) that are misinterpreted. To better understand how this misinterpretation happens, imagine walking into a restaurant. At the same moment that you walk in, a man sitting at the counter begins to cough. Most people would not think twice about this coincidence and might not even notice it at all. A person who is suffering from delusions, however, may not only notice the cough, but may immediately decide that the man coughed to signal other people in the restaurant.
2. Hallucinations
Many people with schizophrenia experience auditory hallucinations (hearing voices or noises that are not real). Sometimes people with auditory hallucinations hear voices that insult them or tell them what to do. Others might hear voices arguing with each other or might hear their own thoughts being spoken out loud. One person with schizophrenia said that having auditory hallucinations is like listening to headphones with the volume on the highest level and not being able to turn it down in order to carry on conversations with people, read, watch TV, or even sleep.
3. Disorganized speech
Many people with schizophrenia have loose associations. This means that they leap from one idea to another even though the two ideas are not connected in any logical way. As a result, their speech is often very disorganized and hard for other people to understand.
4. Negative symptoms
a. Blunted affect. Many people with schizophrenia have blunted affect, or trouble showing emotions. They show less anger, sadness, joy and other feelings than most people do.
b. Poverty of speech. When asked questions, people with poverty of speech will often give short answers that do not carry much meaning.
c. Avolition. Lost of motivation to set goals for themselves and work toward these goals. Usually, they have trouble completing task or work.
5. Disorganized or catatonic behavior
Disorganized behavior people with schizophrenia might do bizarre things that are socially inappropriate, such as suddenly shouting or swearing in a public place. Often, they have hard time taking care of their basic needs, such as bathing, dressing properly, and even eating regularly.
Generally, catatonic schizophrenics believe that they must remain motionless or focus exclusively on certain limited motions in order to avoid catastrophic consequences. Usually, they lock themselves into rigid postures for hours or days at a time.
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