Research: Mental Illness

Since 1982, there has been at least 62 mass murders across the USA and acute paranoia, delusions and depression have been common mental illnesses among these killers, with at least 35 committing suicide on the scene. So what leads one mentally ill person to violence but not another? It may be the stigma of mental illness that provokes it, by increasing the existing symptoms of delusion, disconnection from reality and social withdrawal.

Symptoms of Schizophrenia

1. Delusions and auditory/visual, hallucinations.
2. Disordered thoughts and speech.
3. Sloppiness of dress and hygiene, and loss of motivation and judgment.
4. Pattern of emotional difficulty, for example lack of responsiveness.
5. Paranoia.
6. Social isolation.
7. Substance abuse.
8. Stigma of Schizophrenia

Discrimination 

A survey of attitudes towards schizophrenia showed that:

• 80% expressed discomfort with the prospect of dating someone with schizophrenia.
• 77% would feel uncomfortable working with a schizophrenic person.
• 60% think that violence is a symptom of schizophrenia.
• 71% would be afraid for their safety around a schizophrenic person.

This leads to the exacerbation of the symptoms of schizophrenia, increasing social isolation and worsening paranoia and delusions.

Experience of Schizophrenia

• Here is a quote from someone's experience of having schizophrenia in a discriminative society which does not understand the symptoms. After the school shooting in Northern Illinois University on 14th February, surrounding areas and also the nation as a whole increased their suspicious attitude towards schizophrenia sufferers. He documents the behaviour which was conducted towards him, all of which explains why schizophrenic people can feel isolated:
• "I was diagnosed with schizophrenia just a month after Steven Kazmierczak (quickly identified as “schizoaffective”) shot six people to death on the campus of [Northern Illinois University] … Undoubtedly primed by this shooting, wary, uncertain, without enough time to think, my doctoral adviser suspended my graduate assistantship, banned me from the university, and alerted all faculty, graduate students and staff to forward all emails [from me] to her and, under no circumstances, respond."
• This quote portrays the thoughts and feelings of a schizophrenia sufferer after finding out about their illness. This explicitly shows how the stigma of mental illness can have the effect of worsening one's own perception of their illness, and how it can cause sufferers to feel as though there is no hope for them. I thought the language in the passage could be used in our trailer to express the sheer hysteria and depression of someone after being diagnosed with a mental illness:
• "Everything I have ever been told was a lie. My one way out — of poverty, desperation, madness — was never more than an illusion. And then disbelief. And then, how will I ever explain this to anyone, to family, to old mentors? And then betrayal. No language this time, no thoughts; crying, crying for hours. Alcohol, unconsciousness, unbidden dreams.  Even there: repeating their words, over and over and over again. Isolation so intense, there is no way I will ever bridge it. I am lost. Days go by, weeks."
• The quote goes on to explain how they are forced to feelings of violence and murder, using graphic imagery which we could replicate in our trailer to display the harrowing thought process:
• "I fixated on a single vision, me, sometimes hanging, sometimes with gun in hand and a pool of blood on the floor, outside [her former adviser's] office. Suicide, yes, obviously, but also something more: revenge."

Living with schizophrenia

• Watching this documentary, named "Living with Schizophrenia" helped me understand fully the illness and many aspects surrounding it. It featured four characters, three with Schizophrenia and one with schizo-affective disorder who each in turn spoke about their experience of the illness. It taught me many different things which previously I may have not thought to explore. Firstly, the interviewees spoke about medication. They discussed how the usual perception of society is that by taking medicine one is instantly "cured" however, one character in particular discussed how mediation was only one answer for her, and that many other processes had to be undertaken before she was able to feel stable in her daily life. They also expressed how they felt that doctors and psychiatrists did not understand them, and how they felt too insecure to ask questions about their medication and the side effects attached to them, which were abundant.
• Many of them spoke too about how the stigma surrounding their illness was almost as horrific as the symptoms themselves. One discussed how the internalisation of stigma was extremely dangerous and that it caused incredible despair, confessing to the audience that he has had a multitude of schizophrenic friends who have been led tocommitting suicide. In fact, 15% of schizophrenia sufferers will commit suicide in the first five years of being diagnosed. The character said how he believed that the lack of someone to talk to was one of the major causes of this.
• The many stages of acceptance after diagnosis, including anger and denial, were discussed profoundly in the documentary. One showed the audience how drawing was a  method of catharsis for him, allowing himself to express his complicated and sometimes dark emotions. Another spoke about the negative social effects the illness caused, saying that the memory problems which came with it meant he had increasing trouble getting jobs. It was also obvious that sufferers found getting back into relationships and work a lengthy and enduring process as isolating themselves from society seemed a much safer and more appealing option to them.

Child Schizophrenia

• This documentary was about a rare case of childhood schizophrenia, found in seven year old Jani. The illness causes the young girl to hallucinate, and she is constantly telling her parents about her imaginary friends "Wednesday the rat" and "400 the cat", both seeming scarily real to her. These delusions and also voices inside her head cause her to be violent and sometimes disturbed.
• The illness is very rarely found in children, and a doctor from UCLA psychiatric hospital claimed to have only come across a handful in his lifetime. However, it is extremely crippling for Jani's family and forced the parents into buying two apartments, one for Jani and another for her younger brother in fear of the violence she could be capable of inflicting upon the toddler.
• The parents were insistent that they did not want Jani taken away from them, and put into special care. However, Jani's illness makes her incredibly tiring as her parents must engage with her at every moment during the day or else she may slip into psycosis and her hallucinations will overwhelm her.

Ideas for our trailer

• We could include many aspects of this research in our trailer for instance by having:
• One main character with a mental illness.
• Character suffering from discrimination.
• Character forced to violence by stigma replicating that quoted earlier.
• Complex fractured editing to illustrate the mind of a schizophrenia sufferer.
• Graphic dramatic shots to mimic the horror of mental illness.
• A Link with social isolation research on Joyce Vincent and give character a morbid end somehow.