When asked how he, such an intelligent, clever man, could be convinced that he was being recruited by aliens from outer space, he replied that the mad thoughts came to him in exactly the same way as his sane thoughts so why should he not believe in them? 17 John Nash is an American mathematician of some considerable repute who won the 1994 Nobel prize for economics. It is vital for carers and relatives to realise that although these thoughts may seem mad to an outsider, to the person with schizophrenia they are very real indeed. Many people with schizophrenia develop the belief that their own behaviour is linked to world news items. There may not be a clear distinction between each period but instead be considerable overlap between them. 1 This theme may change over time, so for instance the person may go through a paranoid period followed by a religious period followed by another paranoid period. This is one of the reasons why the sufferer finds the experiences so convincing. Although the different experiences can each be described separately they will usually have an overarching theme for instance the experiences may have a religious or a paranoid theme and all of the symptoms will appear to the sufferer to be taking him in one particular direction. The person with schizophrenia will usually experience a range of positive symptoms rather than one alone. Positive symptoms can broadly be broken down into delusions and hallucinations. They are called positive because they describe features which were not present in the person before they suffered with schizophrenia and so can be considered to have been added to their mind set. Positive symptoms are also sometimes called the psychotic symptoms. For instance a person with schizophrenia may be observed constantly wearing clothes of a certain colour, which may seem odd but it is quite understandable if we know that the sufferer is being told by voices that he believes come from God that good angels wear white clothes and that he must do the same. Doctors refer to these periods of unwellness as “episodes”.Īlthough those people close to a person with schizophrenia may observe their behaviour as odd or disturbed, the changes in behaviour will make perfect sense to the sufferer. Rather than symptoms being present at a constant level, people with schizophrenia tend to experience periods of wellness interspersed with periods in which they can become very poorly indeed. Some people with positive symptoms, on the other hand, have noticed that they are worse during hot weather and admissions to hospital with acute episodes of schizophrenia do tend to increase during the summer months. Many people with negative symptoms say that their symptoms worsen during the autumn and improve when the good weather returns in spring. The severity of symptoms can vary from day to day and even with the time of day.

People can experience both positive and negative symptoms together or only one kind of symptom at a time. Negative symptoms, such as withdrawal, represent ways in which the sufferer has stopped doing beneficial things that they used to do before they became poorly. The positive symptoms, such as hallucinations and delusions, represent new ways that the sufferer has of thinking or doing things that they didn’t have when they were well. The modern thinking on schizophrenia is that it has two types of symptoms, positive and negative. Recent Developments in the Treatment of Schizophrenia.Religious and Spiritual Delusions in Schizophrenia.What can be done about depression in schizophrenia.Information for doctors and health workers.Treatments for Paranoia in Schizophrenia.Disclosure – telling other people about your schizophrenia.

Symptoms of paranoid schizophrenia