Mental health

Mental health

Anyone living with schizophrenia understands the true limitations of current treatment options. Antipsychotics remain the single leading treatment for the disorder, and they are riddled with undesirable side effects. Weight gain, tardive dyskinesia, and excessive drowsiness are a few. Much research is devoted to expanding the range of medication options, and few academics have pursued other avenues. However, there is a possibility that treatment for schizophrenia can be approached through cellular methods if long-term research validates early signs of hope.

We've always known we need each other-not just as partners, not just as parents and children, not just as friends who meet for coffee on a Tuesday, but as a community. We long to belong to a community of people where our names are known, our struggles are witnessed, and our absence is felt. Something in us has always understood this, even if we've lost the words for it; even if the culture around us has spent the last century insisting we're better off managing on our own.

No reputable financial advisor would suggest risking your entire life savings on a single stock-like the old saying, Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Still, many people who might follow this financial advice often ignore it when it comes to their daily lives: their self-esteem may depend on whether they get promoted to VP at work, or their success as a parent is tied to their child getting into an Ivy League college or making the varsity football team;

In early February, Canadian researchers reported that rates of severe mental illness among young people have risen alongside increased access to high-potency cannabis (Callaghan, et al., 2022). Around the same time, a new book, A Killing in Cannabis (Kohn, 2024), revisited a 2019 California murder and highlighted how violence tied to the marijuana trade has persisted even after legalization. On February 9, 2024, an opinion piece from the New York Times editorial board

Mind is launching a significant inquiry into artificial intelligence and mental health after a Guardian investigation exposed how Google's AI Overviews gave people very dangerous medical advice. In a year-long commission, the mental health charity, which operates in England and Wales, will examine the risks and safeguards required as AI increasingly influences the lives of millions of people affected by mental health issues worldwide.

Over three decades, Google designed and delivered a search engine where credible and accessible health content could rise to the top of the results. Searching online for information wasn't perfect, but it usually worked well. Users had a good chance of clicking through to a credible health website that answered their query. AI Overviews replaced that richness with a clinical-sounding summary that gives an illusion of definitiveness. It's a very seductive swap, but not a responsible one. And this often ends the information-seeking journey prematurely.

My patient's plea echoed in my ears as anguish and panic reverberated throughout the world in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, a modern plague that, at that time, felt almost Biblical in scale. Her question also brought me back to a discussion about the book of Job that took place in my study group of psychoanalysts, who met monthly for over a decade examining Biblical texts through a psychoanalytic lens.

'The psychological impact of these dark, damp days can be significant. 'Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) affects around three in every 100 people in the UK, is more common in women, and is associated with symptoms such as loss of energy, weight gain and a desire to sleep more. 'We often become more fatigued in the cold and dark, making some of us feel like we just want to hunker down and wait for spring.'

In 2013, when Meredith O'Connor was 16, the music video for her debut single "Celebrity" went viral. Afterward, she channeled her own stardom into championing childhood mental health: As a hyperactive kid, O'Connor says she was often the subject of bullying, and when her music career gave her a platform, she was eager to use it to advocate on behalf of other victims. "I knew my fan base was younger, but I didn't know how many people would resonate with mental health challenges," she says. "I realized there were millions of gifted people that are being marginalized, and that's when I really wanted to start the mental health study."

Recently, the internet has been awash with stories and commentary related to Jeffrey Epstein's sex crimes, many of which are saturated with graphic and disturbing details. Some social media influencers appear to even be counting on Epstein-related content to increase their reach. Not everyone should consume this kind of material, however. When engaging with the Epstein coverage in particular or with graphic news stories in general, some people may be at an increased risk for re-traumatization or vicarious trauma. These include:

I didn't have words for it back then, but the feeling was clear: if I stood out, something was wrong with me. And if something was wrong with me, I wasn't good enough. I remember standing there, already tense, afraid that the other kids would think I looked stupid. Afraid they wouldn't want to play with me. Afraid that being different, even in something small, would mean I didn't belong.

Being hurt by others creates many challenges. How do I right the wrong? Can I get the person to change? Importantly, can I forgive as a way to guard against unhealthy anger? If so, what are the protections of which I need to be aware so that the forgiveness can be healthy and not damaging either to the one who acted unfairly or to me? We will consider seven themes for protecting yourself as you forgive.

As Americans feel increasingly pessimistic about the future, the pressure to "stay positive" has never been more intense-or misplaced. Psychology has long shown that suppressing difficult emotions does not make them disappear. It makes the nervous system more reactive. When sadness, fear, and anger are treated as problems to eliminate rather than signals to understand, the brain remains on high alert. This is one reason forced positivity so often backfires, amplifying anxiety rather than easing it.

Considerations under review by expert subcommittees include broadening the factors used to determine diagnosis; integrating dimensional elements, such as severity, into categorical descriptions; expanding the potential for future discoveries of biological determinants; aligning the DSM with the World Health Organization's International Classification of Diseases (ICD); and reducing stigma. Since the gathering of statistics is no longer a primary goal, a name adjustment for DSM has also been contemplated-Diagnostic and Scientific Manual.

Today we find ourselves living in a world where our lives are virtually shaped by fear. It's been said that we live in a virtual culture of fear where social and economic fearmongering combines with cyber bullying to create an often toxic environment. So threatening is our world that psychiatric epidemiologists estimate that over one third of people will suffer diagnosable fear-related problems during their lifetime, making fear-related disorders the most prevalent of all mental disorders.

Guilt, in certain circumstances, can be a helpful emotion. For centuries, humans have used guilt to help them connect, collaborate, and build community because the ability to feel guilty when we've harmed someone expresses to them that we care enough to feel badly about what has happened. It also motivates us to try to make a repair.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg appeared in a Los Angeles court on Wednesday, where he testified in a trial that has put his company in the spotlight over social media's harmful effects on children. A California woman who used Meta's Instagram and Google's YouTube as a child has said the apps fueled her depression and suicidal thoughts. The plaintiff started using YouTube at age six, Instagram at 11, then TikTok and Snapchat.

It started off as a normal Tuesday. On 25 March 2025 I reviewed applications from university students applying for a summer research position at my lab. I told friends I would bring pastries from Harvard Square for the Friday dinner we were planning. I finalized my schedule for an upcoming child development conference. I worked on my dissertation proposal. The day was busy but not unusual until I left home after quickly dressing for an iftar dinner at the interfaith center.

a meaningful number of people who lie about their age in order to use our services,

"I had ears that stuck out, and I'm sure I was teased about it," Trocino, now 36, tells TODAY.com. "But it wasn't something that I remember being so impactful that I was begging my parents for it. I didn't even know that this was something you could do to your body."

"I think that parenting needs to be called out of the last 40 years," Vaynerchuk said. "I believe that the burnout, the insecurity, all the stuff we talk about, I believe the reason we're buying more stuff is, we're using it as Band-Aids and glitter because we're not strong enough to be secure in what we are and who we are and what we have."

A major review of North Kerry Camhs has found there was a risk of moderate or major harm in respect of more than half of the cases on the service's books in 2022. The shocking findings were made in respect of 197 out of 374 case files - a rate of 53pc - reviewed by a team of consultant psychiatrists, while risk of minor harm was identified in 12 further cases.

If you've spent enough time in workplaces, on boards, or in other community organizations, you've probably had that moment where your stomach tightens in a meeting and you're not entirely sure why. A comment lands sideways. A tone shifts. Someone interrupts you for the third time. You walk away replaying the exchange, wondering whether you imagined it or whether something subtle but unmistakable just happened. That confusion is often the first sign you're dealing with a workplace bully.

If you're watching the Olympics this year, or have watched in the past, you've probably wondered how the top athletes in the world bolster themselves emotionally for high- stress situations, being exposed and visible to millions of viewers in difficult moments, and how they deal with failure and defeat and become resilient. Dr. Cindra Kamphoff, whose MD-level background in sports psychology, two decades of work with professional and Olympic athletics, and The High Performance Mindset podcast, has developed techniques that are helpful to people inside or outside of the sports arena.

The standard explanation is that ketamine blocks NMDA receptors. These receptors bind glutamate, which is a chemical messenger found throughout the brain and body. By blocking NMDA receptors, ketamine increase "brain-derived neurotrophic factor" (BDNF), a protein which I refer to as "Miracle-Grow for the brain." BDNF promotes neuroplasticity-which is the growth of new connections (synapses) in the brain. This has traditionally been viewed as the primary mechanism responsible for ketamine's therapeutic benefits. But ketamine does so much more!

February 20 is National Caregivers Day, celebrating caregivers everywhere, whether they are friends, professional caregivers, or family members, for the hard physical and emotional work they do that often goes unseen. Caregivers also include surviving parents trying to navigate their grief after the death of their spouse, while also supporting children who are trying to navigate their grief from the death of their parent.