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Psychological Disorders

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Analyzing Psychological Disorders
William Cagle
March 29, 2012

Hello. I am so humble to make it this far in the interview process. Per your request, you have asked me to analyze the psychiatric disease schizophrenia. You have also asked me to interpret two case studies of my choice and give my perspective on them. I am very happy to do this for you, especially since biopsychology is my passion. I will start with analyzing the psychiatric disease schizophrenia first. Schizophrenia was a term coined by psychologist in the early 20th century. It means “splitting the psychic functions”. Another common term for schizophrenia is split personality disorder. (Dryden-Edwards, 20011). When you think of schizophrenia, words like madness and crazy come to mind. It is a disease that is made up of many complex and diverse symptoms, which often overlap with other psychiatric disorders (Pinel, 2009). Schizophrenia affects about 1% of the population. It generally starts between late adolescence and early adulthood. Men are statistically affected with schizophrenia 1 ½ times more than women. There are five types of schizophrenia: paranoid schizophrenia, disorganized schizophrenia, catatonic schizophrenia, undifferentiated schizophrenia, and residual schizophrenia. The symptoms of paranoid schizophrenia deal with delusions or auditory hallucinations. For example, the patient might feel as if they have bugs crawling on them when they do not. Disorganized schizophrenia has symptoms of speech and behaviors that are disorganized, and that are often inappropriate. The symptoms of catatonic schizophrenia usually deal with the individual having difficulty moving, abnormal movements, excessive movements, and/or resistance to moving. They also tend to repeat what others are doing or saying. Imagine a person swaying back and forth, repeating the same

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