Schizophrenia Research Paper

Schizophrenia is a chronic brain disorder that affects how a person behaves, thinks and feels. People that suffer from schizophrenia seem as if they are out of touch with reality as they have a hard time distinguishing between what is actual reality and what is imaginary. Schizophrenia is a complex disorder to study and treat as its symptoms are diverse and change during the course of the progression of the disorder as well as overlap with other psychiatric disorder symptoms (Pinel, 448). Symptoms of schizophrenia are divided into two categories to better understand the different complexities; positive symptoms and negative symptoms.
Positive symptoms include symptoms that represent an abundance of normal functioning, some of these symptoms
include: Delusions (as thinking aliens are making him or her steal), odd behavior, incoherent speech or thought, inappropriate affect (failure to react with the appropriate emotion) and hallucinations (such as imaginary voices that influence actions) (Pinel, 448). Negative symptoms include symptoms that represent a reduction or loss of mental function, some of these symptoms include: Affective flattening (reduction or absence of emotional expression), avolition (reduction or absence of motivation), Anhedonia (Inability to experience pleasure), Catatonia (remaining motionless) and alogia (reduction or absence of speech) (Pinel, 448). For someone to be able to be diagnosed with schizophrenia, the frequency of any of these two types of symptoms must be present multiple times in one month. Only one symptom is necessary for diagnosis if the symptom is a hallucination that includes voices or a delusion that is particularly bizarre that interferes with daily activities.
As an illustration of both types of symptoms, we can dissect the video of Larry: Schizophrenia on Psych Lab to be able to understand how someone suffering from schizophrenia can have a combination of both types of symptoms. As seen in the first part of the video, he shows the positive symptom of hallucinations as he hears voices and says he has a lot of companions. He also shares a memory with the therapist as when he was a kid he would create names for the voices, that in his head were part of a baseball team due to his love for the sport. In the second part of the video, he shows the positive symptom of delusions as he explains that he has friends that he can only see and hear. Throughout both videos, he demonstrates the negative symptom of affective flattening as he barely shows any emotional expression and speaks in a monotone voice throughout the whole video when recalling about his schizophrenic episodes. The cause of schizophrenia has been an ongoing investigation through time as no one primal cause has been found.
Many factors can contribute to the onset of schizophrenia such as environmental factors, altered brain structure / chemistry and genetic inheritance. Despite not having one central cause for development most research evidence supports the link between genes and the onset of schizophrenia. Many genes have been linked to the development of schizophrenia but not one gene can cause the disorder without influence from other genes present in the genotype. As stated by Pinel, concordance rates for schizophrenia are higher in identical twins (45%) than in fraternal twins (10%) as identical twins share the same genotype from their biological parents (449). This demonstrates the correlation between the effects of gene inheritance and the development of schizophrenia. Additionally, even though only 1% of the population suffers from schizophrenia, the probability of a close biological relative of a schizophrenic patient is about 10% even if the relative was adopted by a healthy family shortly after birth (Pinel, 448). As we can see genetic inheritance is a huge influence on the development of schizophrenia as even environmental factors may not be able to subside the progression of the
disorder. There is an abundance of evidence that supports the development of genetic factors on the progression of schizophrenia.
As a matter of fact, a study done by Greenwood, Light, Swerdlow, Radant and Braff investigates the interaction between 94 candidate genes and the development of schizophrenia. The researchers used a 1,536-SNP array to interrogate 94 functionally candidate genes for schizophrenia and to evaluate the association with both the qualitative diagnosis of schizophrenia and quantitative phenotypes for schizophrenia. Subjects included 219 schizophrenia patients of European descent and 76 schizophrenia patients of African descent. Schizophrenia patients showed significant deficits on ten of the endophenotypic measures, replicating prior studies and making genetic analyses more accessible on these phenotypes. A total of 38 genes were found to be associated with at least one endophenotypic measure of schizophrenia. Many of these genes have been shown to interact on a molecular level, and eleven genes displayed evidence for pleiotropy, revealing associations with three or more endophenotypic measures. Among these genes were ERBB4 and NRG1, providing further support for a role of these genes in schizophrenia susceptibility (Greenwood et al.,
2012). More evidence that supports the correlation of genes and schizophrenia is another study done by Chandrasekaran and Bonchev. This study is a part of a project investigating the molecular determinants of neurological diseases. The researchers picked from a well-established list of 38 schizophrenia-related genes and investigated their closest network environment. The created networks were compared to recently proposed list of 173 schizophrenia related genes (Sun et al., 2009). 115 genes were predicted as potentially related to schizophrenia and subjected to GSEA. Over 100 signaling pathways were found significantly involved, signal transduction emerging as the most highly significant biological process in schizophrenia development. Next, researchers analyzed two microarray datasets picked from olfactory biopsies of schizophrenic patients. The systems biology analysis resulted in a number of other genes predicted to be potentially related to schizophrenia, as well as in additional information of interest for molecular mechanisms of schizophrenia (Chanderasekaran and Bonchev, 2012).