Schizophrenia homework help - social isolation question?!
Question: I'm still workin' on my schizophrenia paper. Anyways I find reasons why people like that smoke, but what cause them to do "social isolation?" And what do they do - just sit alone for hours? TY.
Answers: I'm still workin' on my schizophrenia paper. Anyways I find reasons why people like that smoke, but what cause them to do "social isolation?" And what do they do - just sit alone for hours? TY.
Most of the schizophrenic patients that I have worked with over the years are socially isolated for a couple of reasons. First, they sometimes display odd behavior in response to auditory hallucinations. So it's a little difficult for others to be around them. This can also apply to paranoia. If you accuse someone over and over of listening to your thoughts or moving your furniture around in the middle of the night, that someone tends to not want to be a friend anymore. Secondly, it can be hard to listen to someone else if your hallucinations, or voices, are so overwhelming that they require your undivided attention.
Regarding the smoking issue, I believe that nicotinic receptors in the brain have been linked with decreases in hallucinatory episodes.
Imagine you hearing voices in your head 24/7. These voices are quite real. Now imagine someone else is trying to talk to you as well. The voices in your head are distracting enough without having to concentrate on someone else telling you something. For a person suffering from Schizophrenia its very hard to keep voices and real people separate, takes a lot of concetration and effort. And if the environment gets too busy they may go on overload.
Social isolation isn't necessarily just sitting alone for hours.....it is more the act of being isolated from/by one's peers. If someone doesn't conform to the norms and values of the society in which they live, they are seen as 'outsiders' or outcasts. Schizophrenia is a very misunderstood mental illness, and therefore people often deem sufferers as 'mad', instead of treating them as what they are: human beings with mental health issues.
If a person from say 100 yrs ago came to be here right now with us, they would not understand our total isolation. Isolation is conditional.
Messing up on social clues,making others angry, responding to other people in non acceptable ways, the "isolation" as you call it is usually a result of small issues over a period of time instead of one item or a bad day. And of course with many individuals today the abundance of street drugs, alcohol and even prescriptions for pain, dull the desire for interaction with others. (OK, I agree, even the abuse of computers have that affect also)
Then the memories of past bad occurances and the onslaught of perhaps seeing todays interactions with others "going bad" and they start to avoid people even more and or abuse more. If you are away from people for just a few weeks then once you lose the small talk capabilities of course the domino effect starts to occur and the more you are alone the more you avoid others and the less you pick up social clues.
Most healthy people who find them selves facing this without mental illness (some one isolated for other reasons) have a lot of work to do to get back in the swing. Someone just on drugs or alcohol has challenges in the same way. The combined effect is crippling.
Getting into or out of isolation is a slow process for someone with mental challenges. It takes outside help and that is hard to find. It is mostly that we do not see the mentally ill slowly pulling away and even when and if we do they react to our well intentioned intervention in negative ways and we step back and let them have more space (islolation). Awfull as all that sounds then the worst thing is that sometimes people with mental illness have families (parents, siblings, even spouses) who have mega problems of their own.
Individulas today have limited resources for handling common issues like broken legs, just think if you had cancer or even say, loss of your eyesight. If you today broke your leg and could not drive your car... could not walk to a bus station, could not get down your steps who would help you?
Paying people to help is not an option for someone who has problems getting to work or keeping a job. And government has been getting out of the people assistance business of late. And unfortunately most of the "Church" got out of the people assistance business long ago.
It is a wonder there aren't a lot more lost souls. Well I guess maybe there are... and they are so isolated we have forgotten about them.