Contents:
- Medical Video: How stress affects your brain - Madhumita Murgia
- The most common risk factors for schizophrenia
- 1. Genetic
- 2. Stress
- 3. Complications of pregnancy or childbirth
- 4. Differences in brain structure
Medical Video: How stress affects your brain - Madhumita Murgia
Often referred to as 'crazy', schizophrenia is actually a chronic mental disorder that makes it difficult for sufferers to distinguish between reality and what is limited to imagination. This is what makes them often hallucinate and hear intangible voices so that they are finally labeled as "crazy people". Everyone can experience this one mental disorder, including children. However, there are a number of risk factors for schizophrenia that you need to know. Anything?
The most common risk factors for schizophrenia
The following are a number of factors that can increase the risk of schizophrenia, including:
1. Genetic
So far, the most important risk factors for schizophrenia are genetic or family history. But actually, there is no single gene that has been proven to cause schizophrenia directly. Scientists suspect that this is more likely caused by mutations in certain genes.
For this reason, a person can experience schizophrenia even though no family member has or is suffering from schizophrenia. And vice versa, you may not have schizophrenia even though your father or mother has had it. More clearly like this.
- If your siblings have schizophrenia, then you might get a congenital gene from them by 10 percent. This also applies if your brother or sister is a non-identical twin brother.
- If one of your parents, whether father or mother, has a history of schizophrenia, then you risk experiencing the same thing by 13 percent. Even worse, this can also happen even though they are only limited to adoptive parents who adopted you from childhood.
- If your parents have schizophrenia, then the risk of schizophrenia can increase by 36 percent in you.
- If you have identical twins who have schizophrenia, the chances of reaching 50 percent of you are affected by this mental disorder.
2. Stress
Although not directly increasing the risk of schizophrenia, people who experience prolonged stress can experience acute mental disorders. This generally occurs in people who experience childhood trauma, so the hallucinatory effects will be carried away until they mature and interfere with their mental health.
Most people with schizophrenia experience trauma because their childhood lives are full of alias violence abusive. They often don't get support to get out of their problems so they become stressful and stressful for a long time. As a result, the risk of schizophrenia tends to be difficult to avoid.
Even so, not a few people with schizophrenia come from harmonious and supportive home life. So, it's not right to say that a violent home condition definitely increases the risk factors for schizophrenia.
Keep in mind, the higher a person's stress level, the higher the risk of a person experiencing a mental disorder, including schizophrenia.
3. Complications of pregnancy or childbirth
Quoted from Verywell, pregnant women who experience a lack of nutrition (malnutrition) during the first trimester tend to be at high risk of "transmitting" schizophrenia to their children.
Especially if the pregnant woman is exposed to toxic substances or viruses that attack the baby's brain. If a child's brain development is disrupted, then this risks increasing the chances of schizophrenia in children.
4. Differences in brain structure
A study found that people who suffer from schizophrenia have different brain structures from birth. Reporting from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), experts revealed that there is an imbalance between levels of dopamine and glutamate, two chemical compounds or neurotransmitters, in the brains of schizophrenics.
Besides being carried away from birth, brain development that occurs during puberty can also trigger psychotic symptoms that lead to schizophrenia. Especially if one of your family has a history of schizophrenia, then you are at higher risk of experiencing the same mental disorder.
