Addictions Share of population with mental health and substance abuse issues

[Angela]

This is 2016. If you go to the site you can check the changes from 1990. Not good news.

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https://ourworldindata.org/global-mental-health

 

[matty74]

So, a disorder of the affluent?

 

[Angela]

So, a disorder of the affluent?

There's been dozens of papers published in the last couple of years showing all these disorders have a large genetic component. The studies are done on identical twins.

You can find a lot of them in the psychology section.

This is just one:

https://www.eupedia.com/forum/threa...e-partially-heritable?highlight=schizophrenia

Depression seems to be about 40% heritable, schizophrenia about 60%. My personal intuition is that when they learn more it may be even a bit higher.

It should cause us to have more compassion.

If you go to the original link, you can follow the progression through time. The numbers increase, which I think shows the changing environment aspect, which is what really interested me. As drugs become more available in certain areas the color changes. Of course, while substance abuse and mental health disorders are an example of co-morbidity, latent mental health disorders or mental health disorder susceptibility can be impacted by drug use. It's a vicious circle.

 

[matty74]

That's quite interesting actually and relevant to my interests. My cousin disappeared about a year ago after spending a week at my house. Smart guy, very intelligent but he always had his issues and I believe drug use exacerbated those issues. He quit his job and moved to Denver, CO and that was the last time we have heard from him. I believe i have relatives on both sides of the family that have had issues with schizophrenia, depression and anxiety.

 

[Angela]

That's quite interesting actually and relevant to my interests. My cousin disappeared about a year ago after spending a week at my house. Smart guy, very intelligent but he always had his issues and I believe drug use exacerbated those issues. He quit his job and moved to Denver, CO and that was the last time we have heard from him. I believe i have relatives on both sides of the family that have had issues with schizophrenia, depression and anxiety.

It's definitely the case that the adolescent years into the early 20's is when a lot of mental health issues and schizophrenia, in particular, surfaces, often in conjunction with some traumatic event, which can range from the death of a parent, a bad break-up, perhaps a traumatic sexual experience, etc.. It's as if the stress acts upon the latent susceptibility. It happened to a distant cousin of mine in Italy, after his girlfriend left him. He committed suicide.

This is precisely the time when young people experiment with drugs. I personally believe they will be shown to be a causative factor in the expression of that susceptibility.

It's also the time when our culture pushes children out the door and into university settings. Some of them, imo, aren't ready for the freedom, the isolation, etc. I know I'm in the minority about that.

 

[Angela]

It's definitely the case that the adolescent years into the early 20's is when a lot of mental health issues and schizophrenia, in particular, surfaces, often in conjunction with some traumatic event, which can range from the death of a parent, a bad break-up, perhaps a traumatic sexual experience, etc.. It's as if the stress acts upon the latent susceptibility. It happened to a distant cousin of mine in Italy, after his girlfriend left him. He committed suicide.

This is precisely the time when young people experiment with drugs. I personally believe they will be shown to be a causative factor in the expression of that susceptibility.

It's also the time when our culture pushes children out the door and into university settings. Some of them, imo, aren't ready for the freedom, the isolation, etc. I know I'm in the minority about that.

This week's "Insitome" podcast is all about polygenic risk scores.
http://insitome.libsyn.com/polygenic-risk-scores-and-diversity?tdest_id=660504