Common Mental Illnesses: Symptoms and Treatments

Posted on Apr 1, 2025 in Psychology and Sociology

Understanding Mental Illnesses and Treatments

Mental illnesses are conditions that present alterations in a person’s thinking, emotions, and behavior. Treatments can be of a psychiatric and psychological nature, and in most cases, a combination of both is used.

Types of Treatment

Psychiatric Treatment

This treatment is carried out using psychoactive drugs (e.g., anxiolytics, antidepressants).

Psychological Treatment

This involves psychotherapy. The therapist reinforces the patient’s own mechanisms to resolve their conflicts.

Neurotic Disorders: Anxiety and Related Conditions

Neurotic disorders are mental processes or states characterized by a high level of anxiety, but without losing touch with reality.

Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD)

This is a disorder characterized by persistent feelings of anxiety. The causes are usually related to work, health, safety, etc. People who suffer from GAD are often aware that their situation does not correspond to the level of anxiety they experience.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

This disorder occurs after a traumatic event in a person’s life. What characterizes people with PTSD is reliving the event through persistent memories, dreams, etc.

Phobias

A phobia is an anxious aversion towards certain people, objects, situations, or events. For example, claustrophobia is the fear of enclosed places.

Psychotic Disorders: Losing Touch with Reality

These are mental disorders characterized by a loss of contact with reality.

Symptoms of Psychotic Disorders

• Hallucinations
• Delusions
• Bizarre behavior
• Affective poverty (reduced emotional expression)
• Lack of attention
• Apathy
• Social withdrawal (Insociability)

Understanding Depression

Depression is characterized by a feeling of intense sadness that is disproportionate in relation to the magnitude of the event that causes it.

Personality Disorders: Enduring Patterns of Behavior

All people have a particular way of dealing with different situations that life presents. This way of coping is marked by our personality and the mechanisms we use to navigate our environment.

Criteria for Defining Abnormality

• Biological Criteria: Assumes a biological cause determines the illness, often detected as an alteration of the nervous system.
• Statistical Criteria: Defines normality based on what is most common. Behaviors that deviate significantly from the norm are considered abnormal.
• Social Criteria: Determined by social norms; behavior that violates these norms is considered inappropriate.
• Subjective Criteria: Proposed by the individual themselves, relying on the person’s awareness of their situation and suffering.

Types of Personality Disorders

Paranoid Personality Disorder

People with this disorder are usually suspicious and distrustful of others. This makes them distant in their relationships. They often believe others are against them and perceive conspiracies or malicious intent behind trivial facts.

Schizoid Personality Disorder

Individuals are typically introverted, lonely, and distant. They do not adapt well socially and do not tolerate the invasion of their privacy.

Histrionic Personality Disorder

These individuals have an excessive need for attention and may “overact” in many situations. They need to create sympathy beyond what might be considered normal. They are often easily influenced and very susceptible to criticism.

Disorders of Childhood and Adolescence

Intellectual Disability (formerly Mental Retardation)

This is regarded as a disability characterized by significant limitations in both intellectual functioning and adaptive behavior. Treatments include early stimulation, pedagogical treatment, and psychological treatment.

Eating Disorders