How heritable is Schizophrenia?

I was reviewing multiple choice questions for an answer bank, and the answer to the rate of schizophrenia among monozygotic twins was given as 50%. I thought this is not that high. So I went had a look a the data. In 2003, Sullivan and Kendler performed a meta analysis. They found. Seven of the … Continue reading How heritable is Schizophrenia?

Confounders, observation, caution.

A confounder is a factor, generally not measured a priori, that may be causing an observed correlation but was not measured or allowed for. The usual method to deal with this in observational studies is to correct for as many factors as present using multivariate analysis. These analyses may have to extend to include familial … Continue reading Confounders, observation, caution.

Three papers, three pictures.

I was putting together a set of slides for teaching tonight and inadvertently ran into some recent data. All these papers are open source, and I will be giving references. The first, by Zhou and others, looks at "left behind children" -- that is children who are placed in the care of relatives while their … Continue reading Three papers, three pictures.

Risk of bias, immigration, and mood.

Do immigrants into a new nation have a greater risk of mood disorders? The standard approach has been to say that this is due to bias of measurement, or institutionalised racism. But minorities do have an increased risk of mood disorders: this may vary somewhat by the immigrant culture and the host culture. There have … Continue reading Risk of bias, immigration, and mood.

Is this generation fragile or cosseted?

Yesterday I was having lunch with a colleague. We both do sessions in the psychiatric emergency room. And we are seeing young men, acutely suicidal, following rejection by a partner. We both reflected on our young years. We were rejected. We were shunned... and my colleague said "But you had resilience". Both of us had … Continue reading Is this generation fragile or cosseted?

Radicalization relates to depression?

This pre publication paper reports on a survey of 608 Bengali and Pakistani people in Bradford and London. It was looking for a correlation between sympathy for violent protest and terrorism and various psychological and social markers. They found one. Depression. Aims To test the impact of depressive symptoms, adverse life events and political engagement … Continue reading Radicalization relates to depression?

Another hole in PTSD.

The idea of Post traumatic stress disorder is that there is a direct and causal effect between the trauma and the psychological symptoms it causes. This has often been challenged, as the current criteria for PTSD can include almost any symptom from depression to anxiety to substance abuse to aggression, including psychosis. There is a … Continue reading Another hole in PTSD.

Linking and shunning.

I'm not sure if I would use the same classification as SSM here. I'd talk about stigma or discrimination when you don't deserve it, and shunning when you do earn repugnance and rejection. And the two should not be conflated. Stigma comes in two flavors: Existential Stigma and Achieved Stigma. Existential Stigma: stigma deriving from … Continue reading Linking and shunning.