Risk Factors for Schizophrenia

Generally, schizophrenia occurs as a detrimental mental ailment that impacts an individual’s way of behaving, feeling, and thinking. When an individual contracts schizophrenia, they show varying symptoms, such as loss of touch with reality and difficulties performing their daily tasks, which have a great influence on their normal way of life, including how they interact with family and friends, among many others (National Institute of Mental Health, n.d.). Schizophrenia development is influenced by multiple elements, including psychosocial, neurobiological, and heritability factors; hence, there is a need to explore further how such factors influence its development.

Psychosocial factors are the first predisposing elements in the occurrence of schizophrenia. According to Turner et al. (2019), most individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia are known to have faced psychological trauma at one point in their lives, which may include separation, divorce, stressors in childhood, death, and sexual abuse. Such incidents increase the development of negative emotions, whereby their prolonged persistence increases the future chances of developing schizophrenia.

Neurotransmitters also have a great influence on the occurrence of schizophrenia. Generally, disturbed brain development results in damage to neurotransmitters, hence negatively impacting their functioning (Kuşman, 2024). Some key neurotransmitters that are greatly affected by a disturbance in brain development include glutamate and dopamine. Interference with the dopamine hormone elevates its super-responsiveness, which results in the development of conditions, including unrelated feelings, perceptions, and thoughts that significantly account for symptoms related to schizophrenia (Kuşman, 2024). The damage to glutamate interferes with brain activity as well, hence affecting the ability to control cognition and emotion, fostering schizophrenia development.

Lastly, heredity also has high stakes in the development of schizophrenia. Genes have been correlated with increased risk of developing schizophrenia. They include genes inherited from parents, which may predispose the offspring to develop this condition. An example of genes affecting the development of schizophrenia is the identical twin scenario. According to Kuşman (2024), an identical twin has an 80-85 percent chance of developing schizophrenia if the other identical twin is diagnosed with the condition as well. The occurrence is tied to the idea of the twins sharing genes that increase vulnerability to schizophrenia as well. Overall, understanding these overlapping factors is key to improving both prevention and treatment approaches to schizophrenia.