Learn-Schizophrenia Symptoms & Cognitive Distortions
Positive Symptoms
- Hallucinations: Sensing things that are not present (e.g., hearing voices).
- Delusions: Strongly held false beliefs not based in reality.
- Disorganized Thinking: Trouble organizing thoughts, speaking incoherently.
- Disorganized or Abnormal Motor Behavior: Agitation, unpredictable movements, or catatonia.:
Negative Symptoms
- Affective Flattening: Reduced expression of emotions (facial, voice, gestures).
- Alogia: Poverty of speech, limited conversation.
- Avolition: Lack of motivation to initiate and sustain purposeful activities.
- Anhedonia: Inability to experience pleasure.
- Social Withdrawal: Reduced social engagement and interaction.
Functioning Symptoms
- Difficulty maintaining employment or school performance
- Problems with independent living skills (e.g., managing money, hygiene, cooking)
- Challenges in social relationships and communication
- Reduced participation in daily activities
Quality of Life Symptoms
- Low satisfaction with life or well-being
- Feelings of isolation or loneliness
- Limited engagement in enjoyable or meaningful activities
- Difficulty achieving personal goals
Depression Symptoms
- Persistent sadness or low mood
- Loss of interest or pleasure in activities
- Feelings of worthlessness or excessive guilt
- Fatigue or low energy
- Changes in sleep or appetite
- Difficulty concentrating
- Thoughts of death or suicide
Anxiety Symptoms
- Excessive worry or fear
- Restlessness or feeling on edge
- Muscle tension
- Difficulty controlling worries
- Physical symptoms (e.g., racing heart, sweating, trembling)
- Difficulty concentrating due to anxiety
- Irritability
- Sleep disturbances
Common Cognitive Distortions
- All-or-Nothing Thinking: Seeing things in black-or-white categories, with no middle ground.
- Overgeneralization: Viewing a single negative event as a never-ending pattern of defeat.
- Mental Filter: Focusing exclusively on the negative details and ignoring the positives.
- Disqualifying the Positive: Rejecting positive experiences by insisting they “don’t count”.
- Jumping to Conclusions: Making negative interpretations without actual evidence (includes mind reading and fortune telling).
- Magnification (Catastrophizing) or Minimization: Exaggerating the importance of problems or minimizing the importance of positive qualities.
- Emotional Reasoning: Assuming that negative emotions reflect reality ("I feel it, therefore it must be true").
- Should Statements: Using "should," "must," or "ought to" statements that set unrealistic expectations.
- Labeling and Mislabeling: Assigning global negative labels to oneself or others based on specific behaviors.
- Personalization: Taking responsibility for events outside of one’s control or blaming oneself for things not entirely one’s fault.
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