acteristics. One of these characteristics that a person may hear “voices” even tough they are completely alone. Another characteristic is that the person may feel persecuted for no apparent reason.”(World Book Encyclopedia). Other more subtle symptoms of this disease include a decrease in the person’s ability to work, their inability to maintain personal relationships and their inability to perform well in school.The symptoms of schizophrenia are divided up into two categories, positive and negative. Positive symptoms of schizophrenia are exaggerations of emotions that a person may feel. These exaggerations of emotions are the cause of the hallucinations, delusions, and strange speech patterns that a schizophrenic may experience. The negative symptoms of schizophrenia are the loss of emotions and mental ability. The negative symptoms cause the person to begin to have trouble finishing activities, show a decrease in, as well as, a dulling in their speech and emotions. Although the exact cause of schizophrenia has not yet been pinpointed, scientists believe that schizophrenia is the result of either physical or chemical changes in a person’s brain. These changes begin during the late teens to early twenties. Unfortunately, the person cannot be completely cured with any of the methods now in use. The next type of disorder is commonly referred to as a mood or affective disorder. These disorders are based upon a person’s mood. The two major types of disorders are depression and mania. Depression is when a person undergoes a period of extreme sadness and mania is when a person is overly happy, excited or overactive. A type of illness that falls into these categories is a bipolar disorder, which is when a person will experience periods of extreme mood swings. Although a person has bipolar disorder the episodes of mood changes are usually brief and he or she can return to normal func...
