Psychological Signs and Symptoms - Signs of a Mental Health Problem

Written by Dr. Sam Vaknin

Confusion

Complete (though often momentary) loss of orientation in relation to one's location, time, and to other people. Usually the result of impaired memory (often occurs in dementia) or attention deficit (for instance, in delirium). Also see: Disorientation.

Delirium

Delirium is a syndrome which involves clouding, confusion, restlessness, psychomotor disorders (retardation or, on the opposite pole, agitation), and mood and affective disturbances (lability). Delirium is not a constant state. It waxes and wanes and its onset is sudden, usually the result of some organic affliction of the brain.

Delusion

A belief, idea, or conviction firmly held despite abundant information to the contrary. The partial or complete loss of reality test is the first indication of a psychotic state or episode. Beliefs, ideas, or convictions shared by other people, members of the same collective, are not, strictly speaking, delusions, although they may be hallmarks of shared psychosis. There are many types of delusions:

I. Paranoid

The belief that one is being controlled or persecuted by stealth powers and conspiracies.

2. Grandiose-magical

The conviction that one is important, omnipotent, possessed of occult powers, or a historic figure.

3. Referential (ideas of reference)

The belief that external, objective events carry hidden or coded messages or that one is the subject of discussion, derision, or opprobrium, even by total strangers.

The Delusional Way Out

Psychosis, Delusions, and Personality Disorders

Ideas of Reference

Dementia

Simultaneous impairment of various mental faculties, especially the intellect, memory, judgment, abstract thinking, and impulse control due to brain damage, usually as an outcome of organic illness. Dementia ultimately leads to the transformation of the patient's whole personality. Dementia does not involve clouding and can have acute or slow (insidious) onset. Some dementia states are reversible.

Depersonalization

Feeling that one's body has changed shape or that specific organs have become elastic and are not under one's control. Usually coupled with "out of body" experiences. Common in a variety of mental health and physiological disorders: depression, anxiety, epilepsy, schizophrenia, and hypnagogic states. Often observed in adolescents. See: Derealization.

Derailment

A loosening of associations. A pattern of speech in which unrelated or loosely-related ideas are expressed hurriedly and forcefully, with frequent topical shifts and with no apparent internal logic or reason. See: Incoherence.

Derealization

Feeling that one's immediate environment is unreal, dream-like, or somehow altered. See: Depersonalization.

Warped Reality

Dereistic Thinking

Inability to incorporate reality-based facts and logical inference into one's thinking. Fantasy-based thoughts.

Disorientation

Not knowing what year, month, or day it is or not knowing one's location (country, state, city, street, or building one is in). Also: not knowing who one is, one's identity. One of the signs of delirium.