Mental Disorder

A Mental Disorder is a human disorder that affects the brain and causes significant distress or impairment of functioning.

• AKA: Mental Illness, Psychiatric Disorder, Psychological Disorder.
• Context:
  • It can typically manifest through Abnormal Behavior Patterns that deviate from social norms and cause functional impairment.
  • It can typically affect a person's Thought Processes, emotional regulation, and behavioral control.
  • It can typically result from complex interactions between genetic factors, neurobiological factors, psychological factors, and environmental factors.
  • It can typically be diagnosed using mental disorder diagnostic criteria found in diagnostic manuals such as the DSM-5 or ICD-11.
  • It can typically disrupt a person's cognitive functioning, emotional stability, and interpersonal relationships.
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  • It can often develop during specific developmental periods such as childhood, adolescence, or early adulthood.
  • It can often co-occur with other mental disorders, a phenomenon known as comorbidity.
  • It can often impact a person's quality of life, occupational performance, and social engagement.
  • It can often carry social stigma that can lead to discrimination and barriers to treatment access.
  • It can often be influenced by cultural factors that affect its expression, interpretation, and treatment approaches.
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  • It can range from being a Mild Mental Disorder to being a Severe Mental Disorder, depending on its symptom severity and functional impact.
  • It can range from being an Acute Mental Disorder to being a Chronic Mental Disorder, depending on its duration and course.
  • It can range from being a Single-Episode Mental Disorder to being a Recurrent Mental Disorder, depending on its pattern of occurrence.
  • It can range from being a Treatable Mental Disorder to being a Treatment-Resistant Mental Disorder, depending on its response to interventions.
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  • It can be treated with a Mental Disorder Treatment (such as an antipsychotic drug, that can be analyzed with a Mental Disorder Treatment Clinical Study).
  • It can be assessed with a Mental Disorder Assessment.
  • It can be assessed by a Mental Health Provider (delivering Mental Disorder Medicine).
  • It can be managed through psychotherapeutic interventions such as cognitive behavioral therapy, psychodynamic therapy, or mindfulness-based therapy.
  • It can be monitored using standardized assessment tools that measure symptom frequency, symptom intensity, and functional outcomes.
  • It can be supported through psychosocial interventions including family therapy, support groups, and rehabilitation programs.
  • It can be a Contextual Mental Disorder, such as resulting from solitary confinement.
  • It can have significant impact on brain structures and neural pathways as revealed by neuroimaging studies.
  • It can involve disruptions in neurotransmitter systems including serotonin, dopamine, and glutamate regulation.
  • It can interact with physical health conditions through complex bidirectional relationships.
  • It can be influenced by socioeconomic factors such as poverty, housing instability, and healthcare access.
• Examples:
  • Mental Disorder Categories based on symptom clusters, such as:
    • Mood Disorders, such as:
      • Major Depressive Disorder characterized by persistent sadness and loss of interest.
      • Bipolar Disorder involving manic episodes and depressive episodes.
      • Persistent Depressive Disorder featuring chronic low mood.
      • Seasonal Affective Disorder related to seasonal variations.
    • Anxiety Disorders, such as:
      • Generalized Anxiety Disorder featuring excessive worry.
      • Panic Disorder characterized by recurrent panic attacks.
      • Social Anxiety Disorder involving fear of social situations.
      • Specific Phobia focused on particular objects or situations.
      • Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder involving intrusive thoughts and compulsive behaviors.
    • Psychotic Disorders, such as:
      • Schizophrenia featuring hallucinations and delusions.
      • Schizoaffective Disorder combining psychotic symptoms and mood symptoms.
      • Delusional Disorder characterized by non-bizarre delusions.
      • Brief Psychotic Disorder with sudden onset and short duration.
    • Personality Disorders, such as:
      • Borderline Personality Disorder involving emotional dysregulation and relationship instability.
      • Antisocial Personality Disorder characterized by disregard for others.
      • Narcissistic Personality Disorder featuring grandiosity and lack of empathy.
      • Avoidant Personality Disorder involving social inhibition and feelings of inadequacy.
    • Trauma-Related Disorders, such as:
      • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder following traumatic event exposure.
      • Acute Stress Disorder occurring immediately after trauma.
      • Adjustment Disorder resulting from stressful life changes.
    • Neurodevelopmental Disorders, such as:
      • Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder characterized by inattention and hyperactivity.
      • Autism Spectrum Disorder involving social communication deficits.
      • Specific Learning Disorder affecting academic skill development.
    • Substance-Related Disorders, such as:
      • Alcohol Use Disorder involving problematic alcohol consumption.
      • Opioid Use Disorder related to opioid dependence.
      • Stimulant Use Disorder featuring stimulant misuse.
  • Mental Disorder Categories based on age of onset, such as:
    • Childhood-Onset Mental Disorders first appearing during early development.
    • Adolescent-Onset Mental Disorders emerging during teenage years.
    • Adult-Onset Mental Disorders developing in adulthood.
    • Late-Life Mental Disorders appearing in older adults.
  • Mental Disorder Categories based on causal factors, such as:
    • Neurobiological Mental Disorders with clear brain-based etiology.
    • Environmentally-Induced Mental Disorders resulting from external stressors.
    • Genetically-Influenced Mental Disorders with strong hereditary components.
  • ...
• Counter-Examples:
  • Normative Emotional Responses, which involve appropriate reactions to life circumstances without functional impairment.
  • Neurodiversity variation, which represents natural neurological variation rather than disorder.
  • Cultural Practices that may appear unusual in certain contexts but represent culturally sanctioned behaviors rather than mental pathology.
  • Intellectual Disability, which primarily affects cognitive development rather than mental health, though they may co-occur.
  • Neurological Disorders such as epilepsy, which primarily affect brain function through structural abnormalities rather than psychological processes, though they may have psychological components.
  • Temporary Psychological Distress in response to significant life events that resolves without meeting full diagnostic criteria for a mental disorder.
  • Human-body Disorder, such as an Organ Disorder, Hemophilia, ITP, which affect physical systems rather than mental functioning.
  • Healthy Mind, which maintains adaptive functioning and psychological wellbeing.
• See: Psychiatry, Psychotherapy, Mental Health Measure, Causes of Mental Disorders, Dysfunctional Emotion, Mental Health Stigma, Psychiatric Medication, Recovery Model, Biopsychosocial Model, Neuropsychology.

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References

2022

• (Wikipedia, 2022) ⇒ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_disorder Retrieved:2022-3-27.
  • A mental disorder, also called a mental illness or psychiatric disorder, is a behavioral or mental pattern that causes significant distress or impairment of personal functioning. Such features may be persistent, relapsing and remitting, or occur as single episodes. Many disorders have been described, with signs and symptoms that vary widely between specific disorders. Such disorders may be diagnosed by a mental health professional, usually a clinical psychologist or psychiatrist. The causes of mental disorders are often unclear. Theories may incorporate findings from a range of fields. Mental disorders are usually defined by a combination of how a person behaves, feels, perceives, or thinks. This may be associated with particular regions or functions of the brain, often in a social context. A mental disorder is one aspect of mental health. Cultural and religious beliefs, as well as social norms, should be taken into account when making a diagnosis. Services are based in psychiatric hospitals or in the community, and assessments are carried out by mental health professionals such as psychiatrists, psychologists, psychiatric nurses and clinical social workers, using various methods such as psychometric tests but often relying on observation and questioning. Treatments are provided by various mental health professionals. Psychotherapy and psychiatric medication are two major treatment options. Other treatments include lifestyle changes, social interventions, peer support, and self-help. In a minority of cases, there might be involuntary detention or treatment. Prevention programs have been shown to reduce depression. In 2019, common mental disorders around the globe include depression, which affects about 264 million, bipolar disorder, which affects about 45 million, dementia, which affects about 50 million, and schizophrenia and other psychoses, which affects about 20 million people. Neurodevelopmental disorders include intellectual disability and autism spectrum disorders which usually arise in infancy or childhood. Stigma and discrimination can add to the suffering and disability associated with mental disorders, leading to various social movements attempting to increase understanding and challenge social exclusion.

2017

• (NY Times, 2017) ⇒ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/14/opinion/an-eminent-psychiatrist-demurs-on-trumps-mental-state.html
  • QUOTE: … Mr. Trump doesn’t meet them. He may be a world-class narcissist, but this doesn’t make him mentally ill, because he does not suffer from the distress and impairment required to diagnose mental disorder.
    Mr. Trump causes severe distress rather than experiencing it and has been richly rewarded, rather than punished, for his grandiosity, self-absorption and lack of empathy. It is a stigmatizing insult to the mentally ill (who are mostly well behaved and well meaning) to be lumped with Mr. Trump (who is neither).
    Bad behavior is rarely a sign of mental illness, and the mentally ill behave badly only rarely. Psychiatric name-calling is a misguided way of countering Mr. Trump’s attack on democracy. He can, and should, be appropriately denounced for his ignorance, incompetence, impulsivity and pursuit of dictatorial powers. ...

2016

• (Gandal et al., 2016) ⇒ Michael J. Gandal, Jillian Haney, Neelroop Parikshak, Virpi Leppa, Steve Horvath, and Dan H. Geschwind. (2016). “Shared Molecular Neuropathology Across Major Psychiatric Disorders Parallels Polygenic Overlap.” bioRxiv https://doi.org/10.1101/040022
  • QUOTE: Recent large-scale studies have identified multiple genetic risk factors for mental illness and indicate a complex, polygenic, and pleiotropic genetic architecture for neuropsychiatric disease. However, little is known about how genetic variants yield brain dysfunction or pathology. We use transcriptomic profiling as an unbiased, quantitative readout of molecular phenotypes across 5 major psychiatric disorders, including autism (ASD), schizophrenia (SCZ), bipolar disorder (BD), depression (MDD), and alcoholism (AAD), compared with carefully matched controls. We identify a clear pattern of shared and distinct gene-expression perturbations across these conditions, identifying neuronal gene co-expression modules downregulated across ASD, SCZ, and BD, and astrocyte related modules most prominently upregulated in ASD and SCZ. Remarkably, the degree of sharing of transcriptional dysregulation was strongly related to polygenic (SNP-based) overlap across disorders, indicating a significant genetic component. These findings provide a systems-level view of the neurobiological architecture of major neuropsychiatric illness and demonstrate pathways of molecular convergence and specificity.

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