Schizophrenia Cognition - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 6 Words: 1873 Downloads: 8 Date added: 2019/07/31 Category Psychology Essay Level High school Topics: Schizophrenia Essay Did you like this example? Abstract Schizophrenia is more than just a serious mental disorder in which people interpret an abnormal version of reality. Hallucinations, delusions, and extremely disordered thinking and sometimes bizarre behavior is a part of the schizophrenics everyday life, impairing their daily functions. Religious delusions are a common form of schizophrenic psychosis and are particularly difficult to treat. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Schizophrenia Cognition" essay for you Create order This paper will present information from the articles, Psychological Characteristics of Religious Delusions and Religion, Spirituality, and Schizophrenia: A Review, and Religious Delusions. It will summarize how a patients psychosis and religious delusions affect their daily functioning. A further look into how schizophrenics intertwine their paranoia and delusions with religion and how it affects their outlook, opinions and possible resistance to treatment will be reviewed. Key Words: Schizophrenia, Religious Delusions, Psychosis Introduction My whole mental power has disappeared, I have sunk intellectually below the level of a beast (a patient with schizophrenia, quoted by Kraepelin, 1919). This quote may be over 100 years old but it still adequately describes schizophrenia in a way that leaves us in contemplation over what everyday life might feel like coping with a mental disorder of this capacity. With all of todays physiological advances, it is unfortunate that there is still no known cause of schizophrenia. However, researchers believe that a combination of genetics, brain chemistry and environmental factors contributes to development of the disorder (Mayo Clinic, 2018). Problems with naturally occurring brain chemicals may also contribute to schizophrenia. While researchers arent certain about the significance with differences in the brain structure changes, they concluded that schizophrenia is a brain disease. There are a couple contributing factors believed to be connected with increased risk or possible development of the disease. These include; family history of schizophrenia, pregnancy and birth complications, such as malnutrition or exposure to toxins or v iruses that may impact brain development, and taking mind-altering (psychoactive or psychotropic) drugs during teen years and young adulthood (Mayo Clinic, 2018). Schizophrenia involves a range of problems with cognition, behavior or emotions. Signs and symptoms may vary, but usually involve delusions, hallucinations or disorganized speech, and reflect an impaired ability to daily functioning (Mayo Clinic, 2018). Delusions are false beliefs that are not based in reality. Religious delusions are a common occurrence in schizophrenia patients. Hallucinations usually involve seeing or hearing things that dont exist, yet for the person with schizophrenia, they have the full force and impact of a normal experience. Hallucinations can be in any of the senses, but hearing voices is the most common hallucination. Extremely disorganized or abnormal behavior may show in a number of ways for a schizophrenic. This could range from childlike silliness to unpredictable agitation (Mayo Clinic, 2018). Behavior can include resistance to instructions, inappropriate or bizarre posture, a complete lack of response, or useless and excessive movement. Symptoms can vary in type and severity over time, with periods of worsening and remission of symptoms. Some symptoms may always be present (Mayo Clinic, 2018). Schizophrenia is not a common disease but it can be a serious and chronic one. Worldwide about 1% of the population is diagnosed with schizophrenia, and approximately 1.2% of Americans (3.2 million) have the disorder (Schizophrenia Symptoms, Patterns And Statistics And Patterns, 2015). More commonly the rate of diagnosis of new cases of schizophrenia increases in the teen years, reaching a peak of vulnerability between the ages of 16 and 25 years. Men and women show different patterns of susceptibility for developing schizophrenia symptoms. Males reach a single peak of vulnerability for developing schizophrenia between the ages of 18 and 25 years. In contrast, female vulnerability peaks twice; first between 25 and 30 years, and then again around 40 years of age. It is uncommon for children to be diagnosed with schizophrenia and rare for those older than age 45 (Schizophrenia Symptoms, Patterns And Statistics And Patterns, 2015) . Schizophrenia requires lifelong treatment, even when symptoms have subsided. Treatment with medications and psychosocial therapy can help manage the condition. In some cases, hospitalization may be needed. Medications are the foundation of schizophrenia treatment, and antipsychotic medications are the most commonly prescribed drugs (Mayo Clinic, 2018). Theyre thought to control symptoms by affecting the brain neurotransmitter dopamine. Other forms of treatment include: individual therapy, which may help to normalize thought patterns and learn to cope with stress; social skills training, which focuses on improving communication and social interactions and improving the ability to participate in daily activities; family therapy, which provides support and education to families dealing with schizophrenia; and finally, vocational rehabilitation and supported employment, which focuses on helping people with schizophrenia prepare for, find and keep jobs (Mayo Clinic, 2018). Summary The research articles presented in this paper are, Religious Delusions by, Professor Andrew Sims, Religion, Spirituality, and Schizophrenia: A Review by, Sandeep Grover, et al., and Psychological Characteristics of Religious Delusions by, Robel Iyassu, et al. The article Religious Delusions begins with how a schizophrenics religious delusions played an important role in the birth of British psychiatry. It then continues to answer the question, what is a delusion? According to this article, a delusion has no perfect definition, however it gives the explanation of a delusion as a false, unshakable idea or belief, creating a phenomenon that is outside normal experiences. This article discusses how delusions are always self-referent, meaning the belief or notion always has something to do with oneself. Delusions are held without any insight, if someone wonders if they are deluded or not, they almost certainly are not. Glenn Roberts (1991) states that schizophrenic delusions may be an adaptive response to whatever initiates the psychotic break. This article further talks about how a schizophrenic case can be made for considering delusions to be a disorder of the mental state affecting the boundaries of self, this is a disturbance in knowing wh ere I ends and not I begins. With the loss of ego boundaries, there is a merging between self and not self that the patient is not aware of. Michael Trimble has stated in this article that there is a slow accumulation of evidence in favor of religious experience being more closely linked with the right hemisphere of the brain. This is due to self-awareness, empathy, identification with others, and more generally intersubjective processes, are largely dependent on right hemisphere resources. The article concludes by saying that when a person becomes mentally ill, his delusions reflect, in their content, his predominant interests and concerns. The article Religion, Spirituality, and Schizophrenia: A Review, introduces schizophrenia as a chronic, disabling condition that impairs ones ability to function. An interesting find this article presents is that religious delusions are help with more conviction and pervasiveness than other delusions with data suggesting that patients with religious/spiritual delusions value religion as much as those without these types of delusions, but patients presenting these delusions receive less support from religious communities. Regarding socio-demographic variables, reports suggest that the religious content of delusions is related to the marital status and education of schizophrenic patients. Occasional studies suggest a relationship between religious delusions and cognitive defects. Research suggests in this article that those with religious delusions are not satisfied with psychiatric treatment and are more likely to not adhere to their treatment plan. Evidence also shows that those with religious delusions have poor outcomes and more frequently indulge in violence and self-harm. The authors of this article reported that 30 out of the 70 studies (43%) have found a relationship between delusions and hallucinations, and religious beliefs. This article concludes by saying that existing data shows religion has an influence on the expression of psychopathology, treatment-seeking behavior, as well as treatment outcomes. Given the importance of religion for many patients, the schizophrenia treatment model should integrate religion in order to achieve a whole-person approach to treatment. The final article being discussed in the paper is Psychological Characteristics of Religious Delusions. This article describes religious delusions as common but particularly difficult to treat. A study was conducted with 383 adult participants with delusions and a schizophrenic spectrum diagnosis. The results showed that religious delusions were associated with having internal evidence for their delusion and being willing to consider alternatives to their delusion. Levels of negative symptoms were lower. No differences were found in delusional conviction, insight or attitudes toward treatment. Their conclusion revealed that there wasnt any evidence found that people with religious delusions would be less likely to engage in any form of help. According to this article, delusions are a cardinal feature of psychotic illness, presented an around of people with a schizophrenia spectrum diagnosis. Religious themes are common across delusion categories, with between 1/5 to 2/3 of all delu sions reflecting religious content. Levels of disability, distress and conviction have all been reported to be higher in people with religious delusions compared to other types of delusions. People with religious delusions appear to be a particularly problematic group to treat effectively and are targeted for psychological therapies. This article concludes by stating that approximately 1/5 of people with delusions have religious delusions. Their attitudes to and levels of engagement with treatment are similar to those with any kind of delusion. Cognitive therapy may be a good fit for patients with these types of delusions to promote a personally meaningful recovery. Method The study involved 383 adult participants who suffered from religious delusions and a schizophrenia diagnosis somewhere on the spectrum. The information studied and concluded was drawn two large studies of cognitive behavioral therapy for psychosis. Results The study referenced was trying to determine whether religious delusions affect a patients outlook on treatment and whether they were less likely to engage in treatment. They hypothesized that they would be have more of a negative outlook on treatment and be more resistant to it. The study could not find any evidence that patients were less likely to engage in treatment. Suggested Follow up Research If further research on this subject were to be studied, cultural considerations and variations may be something that should be included at a more in depth focus. We know that depending on the background, culture and country a person resides in, certain religious beliefs, practices and understanding is more or less culturally acceptable. Some things viewed as socially acceptable or religiously acceptable in one culture may be disregarded, looked down or even outlawed in other countries and cultures. Tying cultural beliefs and background in to the patients views and positive or negative reception towards treatment might provide more of an understanding on the individuals outlook regarding accepting and taking part in behavioral therapies. Conclusion Approximately 20 percent of schizophrenics suffer religious delusions (Psychological Characteristics of Religious Delusions, 2013). The studies suggest that up to 80% of patients use religion and spirituality as a coping mechanism to navigate their illness. The feedback varies as to whether religion and spirituality is helpful, largely depending on whether they experience positive or negative anomalous experiences. What we can conclude is schizophrenia and religion sometimes have a symbiotic relationship. While it can be said that you can find religion without schizophrenia, it is often hard to find schizophrenia without religion injected somewhere in either part of the problem or an effective everyday coping mechanism. As science continues to evolve and we continue to study and understand schizophrenia, it is with great anticipation that not only a cure is found but that we strive to have a better understanding of helping patients cope with such a intricate and mentally debilitating disease.

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Discuss expectancy effects in research Free Essays

Psychological experimentation is a process aimed to prove that certain types of behavior are predictable under particular situations or treatment conditions. These treatment conditions are manipulated in such a way that the setting created by the experimenters will invoke participants to display behavior towards the independent variable in regularity. This, in turn, will verify the experimenters’ hypotheses regarding the behavior in question. We will write a custom essay sample on Discuss expectancy effects in research or any similar topic only for you Order Now Hence, through experimentation, causal inferences between the independent and dependent variables can be reached. However, experimentations do not always go as planned. There are times when experimenters overlook various factors that may wrongly or unnecessarily affect the results of the experiment. These factors are known as extraneous variables, variables that are not the main focus of the study yet may produce variations in behavior. When extraneous variables become frequent and change systematically across different conditions of an experiment, results can be confounded. One of the more popularly known consequences of extraneous variables is the Placebo Effect. Hansen and Myers (2002) explain that this is a type of social extraneous variable wherein participants react to the independent variable according to how they expect the independent variable to affect them (p. 196). Since the behavior of the participants is based on their expected effects, changes that occur may less likely be due to the independent variable. This indeed lowers the internal validity, thereby causing the results of the study to be invalid and inaccurate. In other circumstances, the experimenters are exactly the ones creating venues for extraneous variables to affect experimentations. Like the Placebo effect’s consequence, Experimenter Effect decreases internal validity in such a way that the extraneous variable causes changes in the dependent variable, not the independent variable of the experiment. This happens when the experimenters behave in a certain manner when dealing with participants (Hansen Myers, 2002, p. 198). This may trigger participants to respond in a particular way between or among treatment conditions in order to fulfill the experimenters’ non-verbal cues. Fortunately, this effect may be controlled through a method called Double-blind experiment, say Hansen and Myer. This technique—when combined with consistency of instructions and processes, and objectivity of observations—can prevent the decrease in internal validity for both the experimenters and participants are not aware or are â€Å"blinded† with regard to the treatment condition they are handling or partaking, respectively (2002, p. 02). Since both parties have no idea on the nature of the treatment conditions they are assigned to, no bias or extraneous variables shall therefore arise and results produced shall be correct. For instance, it is deemed that caffeine keeps individuals alert and awake. This may be further tested through an experiment, with a hypothesis which states that caffeine can improve night driving for tired drives. The independent variable here is the presence or absence of caffeine in the coffee drank by the participants while the dependent variable is their performance in a car-racing video game, specifically their recorded speed after three laps. In order for both the experimenters and the participants to respond without bias, the Double-blind Method can be applied. Given that coffee does ward off drowsiness and stimulate attentiveness, what remains to be critical is the effect of caffeinated or decaffeinated coffee on performance. Since the participants do not actually know if the coffee they are to drink has caffeine in it or not, they cannot behave based on what they think is expected from them. Likewise, the experimenters shall not be able to give indications or implications regarding the nature of the treatment condition the participants are in since they are also unaware of this. Thus, if the participants performed better subsequent to drinking caffeinated coffee or vice versa, experimenters will be sure that the presence or absence of coffee is responsible for this and not an extraneous variable. How to cite Discuss expectancy effects in research, Essays

Subsequent Handling of Relationships with the Families Samples for Stu

Question: How Do Subsequent Handling Of Relationships With The Families? Answer: Introduction The report has gone through the incident of the Malaysian Airlines accident and loss of the flight MH370. The study has reviewed few articles, some of them are peer-reviewed and some of them are news articles. The study has covered the crisis and the factors of the incident happened with the passengers of the flight MH370 and the company image of Malaysian Airlines affected by this incident (Idid 2016). The report discusses about the main incident and the reasons behind the incident. Along with that, the report has critically analyzed the incident and factors relating to it. The study has gone through the effect of this incident on the company Malaysian Airlines and recommended few strategies for the matter of public relation management for the company (Dailymail.co.uk 2016). The report is a detailed analysis on the case study of the incident happened with the flight MH370 on 8th March 2014. The report draws a conclusion and few recommendations of strategies relating to the PR management. Main Report The Malaysian Airlines Flight MH 370 was scheduled on the 8th March 2014 to fly from Kuala Lumpur International Airport to Beijing Capital International Airport. The flight get disappeared after 1:19 MYT, 8th March, 2014 and the last position recorded as on the South China Sea. The aircraft was carrying 12 Malaysian Crew members, 227 passengers from 15 nations (Bremner 2015). The news report states that, the aircraft was shifted from its pathway and deviated towards the west side. The craft is considered as the most expensive and the largest craft of the Malaysian airlines. The Malaysian Government established the Joint Investigation Team to find out the reasons behind the incident. The foreign aviation authorities also worked for this case. The crews and the aircraft communication system didnt communicated about any distressed signal, bad weather, or any technical problems during the flight (Macnamara). From the investigation, it is reported as the two of the total passengers were travelling on stolen passports and they have accused as the suspect for this incident. The Malaysian police identified the captain as the main suspect of the human intervention. This incident is considered as the second deadliest incident of the Malaysian Airlines history (Moore-Copple, Climek and Pritchard 2015). According to the article written by Minter, published in Bloomberg.com states that, the news and the controversies regarding the incident happen with the flight MH370 were discussed more above one year. The missing flight and the controversies and the responses of the Malaysian Government also discussed in various news articles for a long time. The PR management of the Government due to this incident was recorded as, the Government did various meetings with the foreign journalists along with the senior Malaysian officials and the conversations lead to various contradictory, evasive and arrogant ways of communication (Chong And Chang 2016). The situation of the families of the victims was sensitive due to this incident. However, the responsible officials had handled the situation without considering the situation of the family members of the victims. The arrogance shown by the senior officials put the first time visitors in the conception of unrevealing approaches about the incident. The Malaysian government has faced various criticisms due to this incident (Minter, Feldman and Cowen, 2015). The international articles reported as the incident has increased the curiosity of the foreign journalists along with the journalists of Malaysia and the people have emerged in questioning the government officials about the incidents. However, the ignorance of the government officials has influence the curiosity and approaches of the journalists to enquire about the incident more crucially as they have suspected the government officials as responsible for this disappearance. The investigations reported as, 153 of the passengers were Chinese, thus the Chinese officials also criticized the Malaysian Government for this incident and loss. The news article has reported that, the incident has changed the Aviation business industry of Malaysia along with various government norms (Sing, Loon and Wei 2014). According to the news article by Time.com, the searching of the flight MH370 across over a million square miles had cost of tens of millions dollars. The cost has affected the economy of various countries including Malaysia and neighbor countries. In the middle of July, a similar incident happened with the flight MH17 (Yao 2015). However, the reason of disappearance of this flight was clear since the Russia and Ukraine has a fight at that time. Most of the people had argued about the bad luck of the Malaysian Airlines. Though the disappearance of the flight MH370 stayed in mystery. The authority of the company has invested around $1.7 billion for the makeup of the deficit in the reputation along with the positive engagement of the employees in their work (Time.com 2015). According to the report by Theguardian.com, the management team of Malaysian Airlines has approached to change the name of the carrier of the flights along with few of investments for the regaining the brand image in the Aviation market. The management announced the name and brand change of the flights of Malaysian Airlines to regenerate the marketing impacts on the target customers (War and Crimes). However, the company has given the example of the Japan Airlines that have rebranded their flights after a severe crash of one flight. The carrier repainted all the planes along with their rebranding models. The procurements and the logistics are also got changed and the customer service strategies also got changed due to recovering the brand image and their potential in the market (Stockdale and Steeper 2015). Due to expenses, the Malaysia Airlines fall into huge financial loss and still it is facing various financial crisis. The management used to know that, the incidents will decrease their sales in the aviation market along with ruining the reputation. However, the media communication was not efficient due to various reasons like the joining of the New CEO (West 2014). According to the report by Dailymail.co.uk, the captain held responsible for the incident of MH370. In the industrial view, the competitors of Malaysian Airlines (MA) strategically used the issues of the incident and grabbed the market share of MA. The company had put into a battle with the low-cost entrants like Indonesias Lion Air, Malaysias Air Asia and similar other companies. The travellers of various countries had strongly criticized the service quality of Malaysian Airlines. The reaction to the second disaster has diminished the potential approaches of MA for the regaining of brand image. It is accounted around 60% of the sales fall due to the two incidents (Boss and Ishii 2015). The gesture of the MA was considered as insufficient among the passengers of the flights. The redemption of the total cost bared by the company need a long time for the company. The government has acquire the ownership of the company to support it in reconstructing its services and fundamentals. The falling sales had put a cost of around $222 million on the company (Dailymail.co.uk 2016) Conclusions The study of the case of disappearance of the flight MH370 of Malaysian Airlines has given a fall in the growth of the brand. Along with that, some of the official of the company held responsible for the incident and this things ruined the reputation of the Malaysian Airlines. The recovering process of the incident has put the company in a huge financial loss along with the loss of the brand image in the market. The study has found that, the company has adopted various strategies for recovering their brand image and market position in the aviation sector of the Malaysia and globally. Along with that, the management has tried to approach their target customers with low-price approaches which held the company suffer the severe market competition with the low-priced airline companies along with the potential loss of customer base of the organization. However, the government has supported the company in this situation by acquiring the ownership of the organization. In the recovering process the company has faced various management changes which also effected the workforce along with the business profile of the company. The report concludes that, the loss incurred by the company can be recollected by sales in long years. However, there are various other ways to recover the company from the scenario. The report recommends few strategies to recover from the situation by managing the Public Relation aspect Recommendations The PR management dept. of the company should follow the strategies as mentioned below- The faith gaining strategies need to be implemented. For this purpose, various past good records can be used for the advertisement and promotion purposes. Adopting new marketing strategies for the promotional purposes. Hiring new employees for the post of Pilot, cabin crew and press release about such hiring along with promotions. Establishing a new business model by enabling a celebrity profile of the new hires. This strategy will help to renovate the brand image of the company along with promotions. References Boss, P. And Ishii, C., 2015. Trauma and ambiguous loss: The lingering presence of the physically absent. InTraumatic stress and long-term recovery(pp. 271-289). Springer International Publishing. Bremner, L., 2015. Fluid ontologies in the search for MH370.Journal of the Indian Ocean Region,11(1), pp.8-29. Chong, A. And Chang, J.Y., 2016. Security competition by proxy: Asia Pacific interstate rivalry in the aftermath of the MH370 incident.Global Change, Peace Security,28(1), pp.75-98. Dailymail.co.uk. 2016. Veteran US pilot claims MH370's captain hijacked and crashed the plane. [online] Available at: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3394086/Veteran-airline-pilot-claims-MH370-s-captain-hijacked-crashed-Malaysia-Airlines-aircraft-238-passengers-crew-board.html Idid, S.A., 2016. News diffusion studies: Malaysian cases in a global context. Macnamara, J., A review of public communication. Minter, A., Feldman, N. And Cowen, T. 2015. How MH370 Changed Malaysia. [online] Bloomberg View. Available at: https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2015-03-06/how-mh370-changed-malaysia Moore-Copple, J.J., Climek, M. And Pritchard, R.S., 2015, March. Rumor Control or Rumor Central: What the Handling of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370s Disappearance Can Tell Us About the Impact of Interest and Ambiguity on Crisis Response Over Time. In18 The international public relations research conference(p. 280). Sing, G.T., Loon, G.L.G. and Wei, Y.Y., 2014.Factor Influence The Public Perception On Brand Image After Airline Crisis: Mh370(Doctoral dissertation, UTAR). Stockdale, S. And Steeper, C., 2015.Risk: All That Matters. Hodder Stoughton. Time.com. 2015. Malaysia Airlines Struggles 1 Year After Flight 370 Vanishes. [online] Available at: https://time.com/3734928/malaysia-airlines-flight-370-mh370-disappearance-anniversary-carrier/ War, U.N. and Crimes, W., Global Research. West, K. 2014. Is there a future for Malaysia Airlines after flights MH370 and MH17?. [online] Theguardian.com. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/29/is-there-a-future-for-malaysia-airlines Yao, S., 2015. Malaysian flight MH370 reports: a critical discourse analysis.The New English Teacher,9(2), pp.127-150.