Lecture 27

Biology of Mental Disorders

Symptoms of Schizophrenia

• Bizarre disturbances in thought (dissociative thinking)

• Paranoid and grandiose delusions

• Auditory hallucinations

• Odd array of emotional changes

Dopamine hypothesis and schizophrenia

• Amphetamine psychosis

• Antipsychotic drugs

• Parkinson’s disease

• Psychotogen hypothesis

Autism

• Social isolation

• Stereotyped behaviors

• Resistance to change in routine

• Abnormal sensory responses

• Insensitivity to pain

• Inappropriate emotional expressions

• Disturbances of movement

• Speech deficits

Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder

• Hyperactivity and inattentiveness

• More likely in boys than girls

• Treated with ritalin – a dopamine reuptake inhibitor

• May have a genetic link….?

• No gross brain differences, although volume is about 4% less than normal. Also reduced blood volume in the basal ganglia

Depression

• Unhappy mood rather than sadness

• Unipolar vs. Bipolar disorders

• Lithium can help relieve symptoms of BP

• Monoamine hypothesis of depression

Drugs used to treat depression

• Monoamine oxidase inhibitors (inhibit the enzyme that breaks down 5-HT, NE, and DA)

• Tricyclics and heterocyclics (inhibits reuptake

• Serotonin reuptake inhibitors

• Marplan, Nardil, Parnate

• Elavil, Wellbutrin, Aventyl, Norpramin

• Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft

Sex differences and depression

• Help seeking patterns

• Psychosocial reasons

• Genetic

• Endocrine physiology

Anxiety Disorders

• Phobic disorders

• Anxiety states

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

• Left orbital gyrus

• Caudate nucleus of the basal ganglia

• Serotonin and OCD….??

Prions, mad cows, and Creutzfeldt –Jakob disease

• “scrapie”

• Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE or mad cow disease)