How is mental illness caused

Maybe many of my friends are still afraid when they hear about mental illness because they think that mentally ill people can do anything. For diseases like mental illness, there are actually not many factors that cause it. There are mainly three: one is genetic factors, the second is psychological factors, and the last is age factors. No matter which factor causes it, formal treatment should be carried out in a timely manner.

Genetic factors

Genetic factors play a role in the onset of schizophrenia. The main genetic studies on schizophrenia are as follows: ① Family surveys have found that the prevalence among relatives is about 10 times higher than that among the general population. The closer the blood relationship with the patient, the higher the prevalence. ②Twin research reports found that the disease rate in monozygotic twins is about 4-6 times higher than that in dizygotic twins. ③The foster child survey also suggests a clear genetic tendency. ④There is a lack of consistent results in cytogenetics and molecular genetics research to date. The inheritance mode of schizophrenia is still uncertain, and some people believe that schizophrenia is a multi-gene inheritance. That is, the inheritance of schizophrenia is caused by the cumulative effect of multiple genes, and there is a genetic threshold. When this threshold is exceeded, the disease will manifest. Some people also believe that schizophrenia families, like diabetes families, are the result of the combined effects of genetic susceptibility and environmental factors. Whether the heritability of schizophrenia is apparent depends on the impact of environmental factors on the patient.

Personality and psychosocial factors

Some schizophrenia patients have special personalities, such as being withdrawn, taciturn, shy, sensitive, indulging in fantasy, etc. This kind of personality deviation from normal is called schizotypal personality disorder. Mednick et al. (1987) proposed that the main factors affecting the development of schizophrenia in some patients with schizotypal personality disorder are perinatal trauma, unstable childhood life and lack of parental care. A community survey near New York City, USA, found that the prevalence of schizophrenia in the lower social class was 9 times that of the higher social class. A related survey in 12 regions of my country found that the prevalence of schizophrenia in people with low economic levels was 1.016%, which was significantly higher than 0.475% in people with high economic levels. This may be related to poor material life, heavy psychological burden and more psychosocial stress.

Age Factor

During adolescence, the endocrine system gradually matures, the autonomic nervous system becomes unstable, emotions are easily volatile, and it is sensitive to external stress factors. Schizophrenia is prone to occur during this period, which may be related to endocrine changes.