The Psychology of Mental Illness

In September this year, I'm planning on attending university to achieve a degree in Nursing. To get to this point, I'm currently doing A-Levels, more specifically Psychology and I thought I'd share with you what I've learnt about mental illness and how surprising or shocking the biological aspect of it all is.

There's a common misconception that mental illness is "all in your head" and simply the way your mind thinks. Well, it's actually been proven that those with depression have an inadequate amount of blood supply to the prefrontal lobes (the two bumps on your forehead) something which plays a function in mood. Those who have schizophrenia actually have enlarged ventricles within the brain that can often lead to hallucinations.

People with depression or bipolar also lack serotonin receptors (the chemical that increases happiness and mood) and therefore don't experience this as greatly.

Biologically, it's proven that there's more to mental illness than first though by both society and medical experts and therefore, the whole aspect of "in your head" is actually false.

If little Psychology facts like these interest you, let me know and I'll post more!