The importance of mental illnesses cannot be underestimated due to the fact that numerous people get exposed to such problems on a daily basis. As the evidence from the article written by Latzman et al. (2019) suggests, at least 20% of the adult population across the globe are adversely affected by mental illnesses of various gravity, and at least 40% of teenagers suffer from milder versions of mental illnesses as well. These statistics provide a multifaceted outlook on why it may be important to increase mental health awareness and research mental health conditions more thoroughly to identify possible links between at least some of these conditions. Within the framework of the current paper, the author addresses such mental health conditions as schizophrenia, depression, and dementia in an attempt to develop a knowledge base for the readers and generate an in-depth review of how these conditions affect the behavioural, emotional, and perceptive aspects of one’s personality. The importance of this review may be supported by the fact that if left untreated, mental health conditions could increase the risk of damage given to the patient and their surroundings.
Schizophrenia
Behaviour
Behavioural influence of schizophrenia can be described as a simultaneous hit affecting several areas of human functioning. One of the first (and most evident) aspects of schizophrenia is that the patient would talk about anything and either make no sense or make up inexistent words that they would believe to be real. As it would be discussed below, patients with schizophrenia rarely show emotions or remain expressively agitated for a long time. Another crucial element that has to be taken into consideration is the lack of ability to keep their place clean and do chores accordingly (Morgades-Bamba et al., 2019). One of the most common things for patients with schizophrenia is to repeat certain behaviours from time to time (for instance, wandering). Even though there is a long-standing myth about the increasing risk of violence in people with schizophrenia, modern research disproves it.
Emotions
In terms of emotions, patients with schizophrenia are rather limited due to the visible decline in cognitive abilities. Even though they can anticipate certain events to happen in the future and experience softer analogues of excitement and disappointment, their emotional range becomes significantly shorter (Morgades-Bamba et al., 2019). The reason behind these mental health “downgrades” is that imagination and emotional states of individuals with schizophrenia are restricted and cannot help the person in question to maintain an image for a long time. Existing research projects on the link between schizophrenia and emotional transformations suggest that cognition, imagination, and thinking should be integrated with schizophrenia in order to improve the understanding of the possible effects of schizophrenia on the human mind. Thus, there are questions that relate to how one’s emotional range could be improved once they would be diagnosed with schizophrenia.
Perception
One of the biggest issues linked to perception in people with schizophrenia is their abnormal inability to control their mood swings, laughter, or any other displays of emotional approval and condemnation. The growing sense of anxiety also interferes with their perception of the world because they have fewer chances to remain rational and make decisions that are not affected by their overall-depressive state (Morgades-Bamba et al., 2019). The absence of sufficient eating and sleeping patterns may also be seen as the consequence of developing schizophrenia, especially in adults. The ultimate issues with perception begin when the person becomes vulnerable to delusions, disordered thinking, and hallucinations. At this point, it would be rather hard to treat irregular behaviours or any other disorder-related obstacles caused by a damaged perception.
Depression
Behaviour
The most evident change in behaviour that affects depressed individuals is the steadily decreasing level of motivation. Not only do they tend to slow down their daily operations, but they also start moving and speaking slower, mimicking the decline in their inherent cognitive abilities (Panagioti et al., 2016). This resembles the behaviour of a person that carries weights across the room and has no opportunity to show any kind of emotion in order to reduce the strain on their body. As a result, people with depressive disorder might stop gesticulating as much as they did in the past and display less facial expressions that could give away their mood or intentions. In general, depressed individuals choose not to do anything in order not to get even more depressed in the case of failure. Over time, they could start ignoring their washing and eating patterns, which would have an adverse impact on their physical health as well.
Emotions
The primary emotional signs of depression are the loss of interest in life and a gloomy mood. The person gets away from the activities that once seemed pleasurable to them and becomes haunted by the feeling of guilt that eventually comes out of nowhere. People with depression are also prone to seeing themselves as worthless and experiencing the lack of hope even at the times when the situation is not as complex as they see it. This is why it could be crucial to monitor depressive individuals for death and suicidal thoughts in order to prevent any kind of self-harm (Panagioti et al., 2016). On the other hand, there is constant anxiety that averts people with depression from evaluating their life situation in the most appropriate way and making rational decisions that would prevent them from making the matters even worse.
Perception
The problem with the perception that most people with depression experience when under the influence of constant bad mood is the effect of time dilation. Therefore, depressed individuals may be seen as exposing themselves to a kind of a depressive realism where they have to fight against their own wrongful self-conception stating that they are much more depressed than anyone else around them (Panagioti et al., 2016). This suggestion stems from the idea that the human brain tends to compress time when the person is experiencing unpleasant events, which makes the cause of depression and the consequences of depressive behaviours appear closer together than they actually are. The sense of agency in people with depression is damaged to an extent where these individuals start binding cause and effect intentionally. Over time, individuals with depression start losing control over their perception of the world, and it could lead to schizophrenia, as a matter of fact.
Dementia
Behaviour
The behavioural impact of dementia on one’s mental health can be described as multifaceted due to the fact that the majority of dementia cases only occur in adults and elderly adults. The differences in behaviour become evident instantly, providing the ones who care for people with dementia with an opportunity to interfere where necessary. Nevertheless, one of the common transformations that all people with dementia experience is the willingness to repeat a certain activity over and over again (for example, many elderly patients with dementia may be asking the same question even after the answer has been provided and they had approved it) (Miller et al., 2019). On the other hand, such patients become restless and can be either daytime wandering or even walking in their sleep during the night. The ultimate effect of dementia could be the person completely losing their self-assurance, as they would either follow their close ones everywhere or lose interest in any of the activities that appealed to them in the past.
Emotions
One of the sources of impact on emotions in people with dementia is denial. There will be a delay in emotional response to all kinds of situations, even the most moving ones. The person will not be interested in knowing more about their diagnosis, as they would attempt cushioning themselves so as not to confront their inner fears and thoughts. On the other hand, fear is one of the most difficult emotional comebacks for people with dementia because they already feel like they are not in control of their life (Miller et al., 2019). This kind of helplessness is what affects the emotional background of people with dementia the most. Further progression of dementia gives rise to the feeling of guilt as well, making the individuals question each of their decisions. At this point, depressive and suicidal thoughts could take over the person and lead them to irrational decisions linked to vulnerability and self-harm.
Perception
The issues with perception in people diagnosed with dementia mostly revolve around their vision. One of the most common effects is the person becoming able to see from one eye only. The brain merely gives up on processing that much information and closes one of the channels of transmitting information in order to save up space for other procedures. Accordingly, individuals with dementia have a hard time realising how far they are from an object because seeing from one eye blocks the depth of vision to a certain extent (Miller et al., 2019). Overall, any sensory organs could experience a change in perception due to dementia, as the person in question would not be able to evaluate the situation correctly. In some cases, perception disorder could be topped with visual hallucinations.
Discussion
Based on the current review of evidence related to three different mental health conditions, a series of conclusions can be made. First, the risk of dementia may be directly linked to schizophrenia due to the presence of several factors that increase anxiety and fear in patients. The rationale behind this conclusion relies on the evidence from Miller et al. (2019), who suggested that the cognitive decline associated with schizophrenia can cause dementia over time. Nevertheless, there is no clear answer to the question of whether schizophrenia leads to dementia at all times or just during the severest cases. On the other hand, it cannot be ignored that depression is one of the essential risk factors for dementia in people of all ages. Latzman et al. (2019) describe depression as affecting one’s thinking and memory skills to an extent where their other cognitive abilities decline rapidly. Nonetheless, even the evidence presented above does not allow for one-sided conclusions regarding the positive cause-and-effect relationship between dementia, schizophrenia, and depression. Each of these conditions has to be addressed separately anyway if caregivers and patients expect to exert joint efforts in preventing or treating these conditions adequately.
References
Latzman, N. E., Ringeisen, H., Forman–Hoffman, V. L., Munoz, B., Miller, S., & Hedden, S. L. (2019). Trends in mental health service use by age among adults with serious mental illness. Annals of Epidemiology, 30, 71-73.
Miller, L. M., Kaye, J. A., Lyons, K. S., Lee, C. S., Whitlatch, C. J., & Caserta, M. S. (2019). Well-being in dementia: A cross-sectional dyadic study of the impact of multiple dimensions of strain on persons living with dementia and their family care partners. International Psychogeriatrics, 31(5), 617.
Morgades-Bamba, C. I., Fuster-Ruizdeapodaca, M. J., & Molero, F. (2019). Internalized stigma and its impact on schizophrenia quality of life. Psychology, Health & Medicine, 24(8), 992-1004.
Panagioti, M., Bower, P., Kontopantelis, E., Lovell, K., Gilbody, S., Waheed, W.,… & Huffman, J. C. (2016). Association between chronic physical conditions and the effectiveness of collaborative care for depression: An individual participant data meta-analysis. JAMA Psychiatry, 73(9), 978-989.