Schizophrenia: History and Symptoms

History of Schizophrenia

• Emil Kraepelin coined the term "dementia praecox" to describe the deteriorating mental state of individuals with schizophrenia.
• Eugene Bleuler later renamed the condition "schizophrenia," emphasizing the "splitting of the mind." He identified four fundamental symptoms:
  • Blunt Affect: Inability to express emotions appropriately.
  • Disturbance of Association: Fragmented thinking and difficulty connecting ideas.
  • Autism: Withdrawal from social interactions and focusing on internal thoughts.
  • Ambivalence: Conflict and inconsistency in emotional responses.

Schizophrenia Symptoms

• Positive symptoms are additions to normal behavior and include delusions, hallucinations, and abnormal movements.
• Negative symptoms are a reduction in normal behavior and include:
  • Avolition: Lack of motivation and goal-directed behavior.
  • Alogia: Reduced speech output.
  • Anhedonia: Inability to experience pleasure.
  • Associality: Lack of interest in social interaction.

Disorganized Thinking

• Tangentiality: A pattern of speech where responses drift away from the original question.
• Perseveration: Repeating the same word or phrase despite the conversation moving on.
• Neologism: Creating new words or phrases with no recognized meanings.
• Clang Association: Speech that is linked by rhyming or similar-sounding words, not logical connections.

Catatonia

• Stupor: Complete lack of psychomotor activity.
• Catalepsy: Maintaining a fixed posture for extended periods.
• Mannerism: Unusual movements or gestures that are odd or repetitive.
• Negativism: Resistance or lack of response to instructions or stimuli.
• Mutism: Inability or refusal to speak.
• Stereotypy: Repetitive, purposeless movements.
• Echolalia: Repeating another person's words or phrases.
• Echopraxia: Mimicking another person's movements.

Schizophrenia vs Psychosis

• Psychosis: A broad term referring to a mental state marked by a loss of contact with reality, often including hallucinations and delusions.
• Schizophrenia: A specific type of psychosis characterized by persistent psychotic symptoms for at least six months.

Brief Psychotic Disorder

• A diagnosis given to individuals experiencing psychotic symptoms for at least one day but less than one month.

Delusions

• Persecutory Delusions: Belief that one is being harmed or threatened.
• Erotomanic Delusions: Belief that another person is in love with them.