Psychological Problems : Know The Types & Causes

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psychological problems

Your mental health is the most significant area you should always consider for a better life. It indicates all the processes, acts, reactions, impulses, decisions, and coping mechanisms in your everyday living. Mental health can easily be distorted due to many living factors. At the same time, the most devastating thing that impacts your psychological well-being is the distress caused by various events in your life.

To overcome the psychological obstacles that affect your overall welfare, it is always good to learn more about the common psychological problems that occur to people worldwide. That way, you can respond to stress differently and take some steps to recognize the symptoms of mental disturbances early.

This article will discover the most common mental health issues classified by the most widely used system for classifying mental disorders, the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM 5). Stay focused and learn more about the unpredictable or genetic issues that might interrupt every human’s everyday living and welfare.

A List Of Common Psychological Disorders

Neurodevelopmental disorders

Neurodevelopmental disorders are those disorders that are diagnosed during childhood, infancy, and adolescence. The list of these disorders includes:

Intellectual development disorder

DSM-5 defines intellectual development disorders as intellectual difficulties beginning in childhood and mental issues occurring in the social, conceptual, and practical areas of living. Children with this disorder have issues with their communication, intellectual learning, communication, reasoning, planning, and making judgments.

Global developmental delay

This psychological disorder refers to children under the age of 5 with issues or intellectual delay with social and emotional interaction, delayed walking, communication, etc.

Communication disorders

Communication disorders are those with an impairment in the ability to send, receive, comprehend, and process verbal and non-verbal systems concepts. These disorders range in severity from mild to profound.

Autism spectrum disorders

One of the most common disorders among the world population is the Autism spectrum disorder, featuring difficulties with social communication and interaction, often characterized by repetitive behaviors and interests.

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)

One of the most common psychological issues is ADHD or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. This disorder hardly affects people’s behavior and the possibility of maintaining attention on one subject or activity. People with these disabilities often find it hard to focus, concentrate, and do activities with complete attention.

Bipolar and related disorders

Bipolar disorders are also present in a large percentage of the world population, featuring intense mood changes. The mood of people with Bipolar disorders can be extremely high during periods, while they also can be very depressive.

Mania

Mania is a psychological condition that is easy to recognize when people have periods of abnormally elevated and extreme mood changes, changes in emotions, activity, and energy level. When Mania is in a progressive stage, it can often result in grandiose delusions and hallucinations.

Depressive episodes

Depressive episodes also characterize bipolar disorder as a significant part of this mental health condition. According to DSM-5, Depressive episodes in Bipolar disorder are often recognized in people with sad emotions, fatigue, feelings of guilt, sleeping issues, and thoughts of suicide.

Both depressive and manic episodes can always be frightening for people with these conditions and their families and friends. In these cases, people should always seek support from psychologists and other mental health professionals.

Anxiety disorders

If a person has excessive and undoubted fear for the future, it is entirely possible to have an Anxiety disorder. This psychological disorder is characterized by excessive worries, fear, and perceiving the future as a threat.

Generalized anxiety disorder

This condition includes worries and fear that might disturb a person’s everyday activities. People with this disorder often fear everything and have issues while functioning.

Social anxiety disorder

Social anxiety disorder is a disorder that affects millions of people nowadays. It is often recognized when a person has an irrational fear and is afraid of being watched, judged, embarrassed, or humiliated.

Specific phobias

Specific phobias usually have individuals who fear a specific object or a situation in their environment. For example, fear of snakes, spiders, heights, etc.

Panic disorder

Panic attacks are often characterized by brief anxiety episodes, causing physical sensations of fear. Individuals with this disorder always avoid situations where these episodes might occur.

Separation anxiety disorder

This condition is present in people who fear separating from others or attachment objects. It is usually present in children at an early age when they can’t get used to the separation from a parent.

Trauma and stressor-related disorders

These disorders are caused by trauma or stress in life and include several types, such as:

Acute stress disorder

This psychological condition can occur after one month of experiencing trauma or stressful events, such as war, death, etc. The symptoms of this condition are: feeling like the world is unreal, a decrease in emotional responsiveness, feelings of being disconnected from the body, etc.

Adjustment disorder

This disorder can respond to sudden changes, such as job loss, divorces, disappointments, or the end of a relationship. This condition can affect both adults and children, and the symptoms are: worry, anger, anxiety, isolation, and hopelessness.

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)

PTSD can develop after a person has had a stressful and traumatic event, such as serious injury, death, or sexual violence. 

Reactive attachment disorder (RAD)

RAD is a disorder developed when children do not form healthy relationships with their adult caregivers or are often emotionally abused. Children with this condition have issues managing their own emotions.

Dissociative Disorders

According to DSM-5, Dissociative disorders involve an interruption or dissociation with consciousness, including identity or memory issues. These disorders include:

Dissociative amnesia

This is a condition in which an individual can’t remember essential information related to their life. This disorder can often occur due to some trauma in life and can last for several years or some shorter period.

Dissociative identity disorder

This psychological disorder involves the presence of two or more personalities in one person. Each of these identities can function differently in the social environment. Generally, people with this condition have changes in memory, consciousness, emotional response, and perception.

Derealization/depersonalization disorder

Depersonalization disorder is recognized when a person feels disconnected from their body. It is often described as people seeing themselves outside their bodies or feeling like they’re dreaming.

Somatic Symptoms Disorders

Somatic symptom disorders are classified as psychological disorders that involve physical symptoms that may not have any physical cause. People with these conditions are often preoccupied with physical symptoms that negatively impact their behavior and social adjustment. This group involves:

Illness anxiety disorder

Illness anxiety disorder is a severe mental disorder previously known as hypochondria. It features persistent fear that a person has some illness despite not having any physical symptoms. People with this condition often struggle and they might have some serious health problems even if medical tests show the opposite.

Conversion disorder

DSM-5 diagnoses this disorder when a person has weakness or paralysis, swallowing symptoms, anesthesia or sensory loss, or abnormal movement. It is a condition when people experience some motor or sensory symptoms without having a compatible medical explanation.

Factitious disorder

This condition is diagnosed when a person fakes illness to attract attention without any obvious reason and gain. Munchausen syndrome is one of these disorders, though.

Feeding And Eating Disorders

Eating disorders are prevalent and characterized by obsessive concerns with weight or disruptive eating patterns that impact the overall physical and mental health. Eating disorders are the following:

Anorexia nervosa

Anorexia nervosa is diagnosed when a person is obsessed with their weight and tends to excessive weight loss, including starving and restricted food consumption. 

Bulimia nervosa

Bulimia nervosa is also an eating disorder characterized by binge eating. This disorder, featuring in overeating, often ends up in vomiting.

Rumination disorder

Rumination disorder is common mainly in children, young people, and adolescents, resulting in spitting the food they enter within their bodies. This disorder is more common in people with depression, anxiety, or other psychiatric illnesses.

Pica

Often caused by traumas in childhood or other issues during adulthood – the Pica disorder features in eating things that are not food. It can often be caused by nutritional deficiency or other mental health conditions.

Binge eating disorder

Binge eating disorder is a life-threatening and severe condition that results in eating large amounts of food in a short time. Individuals with this health condition have no control over their eating, while sometimes this disorder might be triggered by stressful events, happiness, anxiety, boredom, etc.

Sleep disorders

Sleep disorders can be very irritating for a person and feature in interruption of the sleep pattern, which causes issues during daily functioning. Sleeping disorders include:

Narcolepsy

This condition is a chronic sleep disorder, often characterized by overwhelming drowsiness during the daytime and sudden attacks of sleep. People with this condition have issues with being awake, regardless of the circumstances.

Insomnia

Insomnia is one of the most irritating sleep disorders when a person has difficulties falling asleep and resting well throughout the night. It can often be caused by medications, mental health issues, distress, etc.

Hypersomnolence

Hypersomnia is often characterized by excessive sleep, even during the daytime. People with this condition need to take a nap several times a day.

Breathing-related sleep disorders

Sleep apnea is a severe condition that occurs during sleep and features breathing that is often interrupted and starts over again after a short period. If you snore during sleep, you might have sleep apnea.

Parasomnias

Parasomnia is a disruptive sleep disorder characterized by abnormal movements, talk, and actions during sleep. Some of the examples include sleepwalking, nightmares, sleep terrors, etc/

Restless legs syndrome

RLS is a neurological condition often characterized by uncomfortable sensations in the legs and interrupting sleep at night.

Disruptive, impulse control, and conductive disorders

This psychological disorder involves a group of conditions that cause difficulties in controlling aggressive behavior, impulses, self-control, etc. Some of these disorders involve:

Kleptomania

Kleptomania is an inability to resist urges to steal things and objects a person doesn’t need and usually things that don’t have any value.

Pyromania

It is a type of impulse control disorder diagnosed if a person cannot resist starting fires without reason. People with this condition usually feel excited and tense before starting a fire.

Intermittent explosive disorder

IED appears to be a mental health condition characterized by impulsive anger and aggression. Individuals with this disorder may erupt into angry emotions and act in response to everyday situations.

Conduct disorder

This disorder is often found in children below the age of 18. Children with this disorder usually have violent attitudes to other people and animals for no reason. These young people with Conduct disorder have trouble adjusting to normal behavior in their social environment.

Oppositional defiant disorder

ODD is a type of behavior diagnosed in childhood, featuring anger, aggression, irritability, and defiance towards parents, teachers, and peers. These children are more troubling to others than to themselves.

Depressive disorders

Whenever a person feels sad, weak, and empty, it is possible to have some of the most common depressive disorders. Various types of depressive disorders are available, depending on their duration, causes, and timing:

Major depressive disorder

This condition is diagnosed when a person often loses interest in activities and has a depressive mood. That way, an individual is unable to function in the environment.

Persistent depressive disorder

It is a type of chronic depression that distinguishes itself from other types due to its longer-lasting symptoms.

Premenstrual dysphoric disorder

PMDD is a type of depression in women before their period starts. Symptoms usually begin one or two weeks before the period starts and go away after it is finished.

Depressive disorder due to other medical conditions

It is a type of depression usually diagnosed when a person has a medical history that indicates that depression appeared as a consequence of a particular health condition.

Substance-induced depressive disorder

This type of depression often occurs when a particular medication is taken, and a person notices depressive emotions and decreases in pleasure or interest.

Other specified depressive disorders

This type of diagnosis is for those cases that do not meet the criteria of any depressive disorder and require further exploration and diagnosis.

Addictive disorders and substance use

These psychological problems occur with alcohol, cocaine, opiates, or methamphetamine misuse. It is also good to know that these disorders include substance-infused mental health conditions, such as delusions, psychosis, anxiety, or delirium. In this category of addictive disorders, smokers and gamblers are also involved. Millions of people globally face psychological issues and difficulties due to the attempt to quit smoking, gambling, drinking, etc.

Neurocognitive disorders

According to DSM-5, the term Neurocognitive disorder is used to describe the decreased mental ability and function as a consequence of medical disease or psychiatric illnesses. Cognitive disorders involve:

Delirium

Delirium, as a part of neurocognitive disorders, is a severe mental health condition that usually results in reduced awareness of the environment in a person and confused thinking or perception.

Other neurocognitive disorders

The other neurocognitive disorders are diagnosed as those affecting memory, language, attention, learning, and perception.  These mental health conditions can be caused by Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, substance use, and others.

Schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders

Schizophrenia is one of the most common mental health conditions worldwide, affecting millions of people across the globe. It is a chronic psychiatric disorder, entirely severe, that leaves a person’s intelligence untouched until the illness’s last stadium. According to DSM-5, a person has Schizophrenia if they have various symptoms for a more extended period.

People with this devastating mental health disease might have several symptoms that indicate the presence of Schizophrenia:

  • Delusions
  • Hallucinations
  • Quitting the relationship with reality
  • Disorganized speech
  • Issues with feeling pleasure, rational judgment
  • Bizarre behavior and movements

Individuals with Schizophrenia have difficulties maintaining relationships, poor motivation, poor school performance, a need for social distance, etc. It is a common disease in both men and women, showing its early signs earlier in men. 

This psychotic disorder usually starts in young teenagers and among people above 20. Many scientific studies have shown that multiple factors can contribute to the appearance of this mental health disorder in people, but the exact reason is unknown.

Obsessive-compulsive and related disorders

The diagnostic criteria of DSM-5 indicate that an individual diagnosed with  obsessive-compulsive disorder must have obsessions, compulsions, or both symptoms. Obsessions always refer to the consistent will to do a particular activity, for example, washing hands, playing with an object, cleaning, etc. Conversely, compulsions are related to repetitive behaviors that people must do to reduce anxiety.

Personality disorders

Personality disorders involve ten mental health conditions often characterized by abnormal thinking, perceiving, communicating, and interacting with a person’s social environment. These disorders include:

Antisocial personality disorder

This type of disorder is diagnosed if an individual does not live life by the social principles and rules. It can often be featured in criminal behavior, disrespecting the moral ethic and social norms.

Avoidant personality disorder

People with this type of disorder often feature in social isolation, fear of social adjustment, and criticism. These individuals can often be recognized as being socially awkward and shy.

Borderline personality disorder

BPD is a severe mental health condition that is recognizable by impacting how people think and feel, causing issues with the self-image and self-concept, and causing problems in everyday living.

Dependent personality disorder

It is an anxious personality disorder, and people with this severe condition often feel helpless and incapable of caring for themselves and others. These individuals often have issues in making simple decisions in life.

Histrionic personality disorder

People with this mental health condition want to be in the center of the world. Individuals who suffer from this disorder usually seek attention at social events and try to be noticed. This severe health condition also involves inappropriate behavior from people only to attract attention.

Narcissistic personality disorder

People who suffer from this psychological disease have an inflated sense of their proper importance and existence. This disorder also involves a lack of empathy, trouble maintaining connections, etc.

Obsessive-compulsive personality disorder

Many people can confuse obsessive-compulsive personality disorder with OCD. It is good to know that this personality disorder differs from OCD and features a need for orderliness, control, and perfectionism.

Paranoid personality disorder

A paranoid person is considered a person that is suspicious of other people without any reason to be. Individuals with PPD are always on their guard, believing that others may harm, hurt, and threaten them.

Schizoid personality disorder

Schizoid personality disorders are present in people who don’t have any interest in social interactions and have a lack of emotional expression. Generally, people with schizoid personality disorder are detached from social interactions and relationships.

Schizotypal personality disorder

STPD is a mental health condition that features an overall discomfort in people to connect with others and maintain a relationship while these individuals have unusual thoughts, speech, and behavior.

Conclusion

Psychological problems are nothing to be ashamed of, while millions worldwide face these issues or live with these devastating mental health conditions. People’s mental health is the most sensitive area that can easily be affected due to many living factors, while it is a brave step to admit that something is wrong and you don’t feel good.

Your psychological problems can always be solved if the symptoms of a particular health condition are recognized on time. We hopefully believe that this article will help you to become familiar with the most common mental health disorders, and you will take the fastest steps for recovery by visiting a psychologist or psychiatrist.

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