Life Events and Schizophrenia

1986 ◽  
Vol 148 (1) ◽  
pp. 12-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. A. F. Al Khani ◽  
P. E. Bebbington ◽  
J. P. Watson ◽  
F. House
Keyword(s):  
Saudi Arabia ◽  
Life Events ◽  
Single Women ◽  
Married Women ◽  
Arabic Version ◽  
Life Event ◽  
Acute Schizophrenia ◽  
Control Subjects ◽  
Event Histories

Using an Arabic version of the PSE, supplemented by CATEGO, we selected 48 patients with acute schizophrenia from the population of the Najd region of Saudi Arabia. Their life-event histories for the six months before onset or relapse were compared with those of 62 control subjects. A postive association between events and onset was established only for married women, although there was a parallel trend for men and single women suffering their first schizophrenic episode. The observed impact of life events was limited to the three weeks before onset. These findings are discussed in the light of Saudi culture.

Life Events and Schizophrenia in Nigerians

1988 ◽  
Vol 153 (3) ◽  
pp. 367-375 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oye Gureje ◽  
A. Adewunmi
Keyword(s):  
Life Events ◽  
First Episode ◽  
Life Event ◽  
Sociodemographic Variables ◽  
Male Control ◽  
Control Subjects ◽  
The Family ◽  
Schizophrenic Patients ◽  
Event Histories

Forty-two first-episode RDC schizophrenic patients were matched on sociodemographic variables with an equal number of control subjects. The life-event histories of both groups for 6 months before onset or interview were compared. Onset of illness was not preceded by an increase in life events. The only significant observation was that control subjects had experienced more events in the month previous to interview. These were reported mainly by male control subjects, involved the family, and were possibly related to the period when the control subjects were interviewed. The observations are discussed within the context of the Nigerian culture.

Life Events and Maintenance Therapy in Schizophrenic Relapse

1973 ◽  
Vol 123 (577) ◽  
pp. 659-660 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. P. Leff ◽  
S. R. Hirsch ◽  
R. Gaind ◽  
P. Rohde ◽  
B. C. Stevens
Keyword(s):  
Maintenance Therapy ◽  
Environmental Stress ◽  
Life Events ◽  
Life Event ◽  
Acute Schizophrenia ◽  
Independent Events ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Significant Concentration

The possible role of environmental stress in precipitating the onset or relapse of acute schizophrenia was investigated by Brown and Birley (1968), Birley and Brown (1970). They enquired about events which could be dated to a definite point in time and which usually involved either actual or threatened danger or important fulfilments or disappointments. They distinguished between independent events, which were outside the control of the subject, and possibly independent events, which were not so clearly out of his control but which seemed unlikely to be produced by unusual behaviour of the subject himself. In their main group of patients a significant concentration of independent events (about 60 per cent) was found in the three weeks preceding onset or relapse of schizophrenia. In examining two small sub-groups they found that 4 of 13 patients (31 per cent) who relapsed after reducing or discontinuing phenothiazine therapy had experienced a life event in the three weeks before relapse, compared with 3 of 5 patients (60 per cent) who had been taking phenothiazines regularly at the time of relapse. Although these proportions are very different, the numbers in the groups are too small for the difference to reach significance. Furthermore the groups were not matched in any way, and there may be important differences between patients who discontinue medication themselves and those who carry on taking it regularly.

The Role of Stress as a Precipitating Factor of Psychiatric Illness

1977 ◽  
Vol 130 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur P. Schless ◽  
Alicia Teichman ◽  
J. Mendels ◽  
Joseph N. DiGiacomo
Keyword(s):  
Life Events ◽  
Psychiatric Illness ◽  
Psychiatric Patients ◽  
Normal Population ◽  
Surgical Patients ◽  
Control Groups ◽  
Life Event ◽  
Event Histories ◽  
Precipitating Factor

SummaryFifty-six psychiatric patients were interviewed to obtain a record of life events preceding admission to hospital, using a modified version of the Schedule of Recent Experiences. Two control groups were studied for comparison: medical and surgical in-patients and a ‘normal’ population studied independently by Myers. Psychiatric patients reported a significantly larger number of events than the medical-surgical patients, who, in turn, reported significantly more events than the ‘normal’ population. There were no significant differences in the specific life event histories between groups.

Life Events and Psychosis

1993 ◽  
Vol 162 (1) ◽  
pp. 72-79 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Bebbington ◽  
Soraya Wilkins ◽  
Peter Jones ◽  
Alice Foerster ◽  
Robin Murray ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
General Population ◽  
Life Events ◽  
Free State ◽  
Psychotic Symptoms ◽  
Significant Excess ◽  
Life Event ◽  
The Past ◽  
Healthy Sample ◽  
Event Histories

Data from the Camberwell Collaborative Psychosis Study were used to examine the proposition that there is an excess of life events preceding the onset of psychoses of all types. Of 97 patients from the study who had episodes within the past year that were datable, 51 had developed psychotic symptoms from an essentially symptom-free state, 29 had been suffering only from neurotic symptoms, and 17 had experienced a marked exacerbation of psychotic symptoms. DSM–III diagnoses were collapsed into three major groups: 51 cases of schizophrenia; 31 cases of mania; and 14 cases of depressive psychosis. Life-event histories were taken for the six months before onset, and when these were compared with equivalent histories from a psychiatrically healthy sample from the local general population, there was a significant excess of life events, particularly in the three months before onset of psychosis. This was apparent in all groups, and remained even when events were restricted to the independent category. The excess of events began rather earlier than has been found in previous studies. In our view, this study provides some of the strongest evidence for a link between life events and the emergence of psychotic symptoms.

scholarly journals Linking Social Media with E-Government Services (Saudi Arabia case study)

2016 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 2731-2739
Author(s):  
Saja Aldera
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Saudi Arabia ◽  
Life Events ◽  
Life Event ◽  
Government Services ◽  
Organisational Semiotics ◽  
Matching Mechanism ◽  
The Right ◽  
Government Initiative

Governments around the world are adapting the e-government initiative to provide new ways of delivering their services. The e-government initiative aims to increase government performance efficiency; however, there are a number of limitations facing the success of the e-government initiative. One of the key limitations is the citizens’ lack of knowledge about the e-government services which, in turn, requires an in-depth understanding of the citizens’ needs in order to provide them with the right service, at the right time. One way to accomplish this is by using the life-event approach, which is considered to be a citizen-centric approach that matches the citizen’s life-events with the needed e-government services. Moreover, with the increasing population using or organising their lives on social media, some services are turning to organising and recording a person’s life. One such example is the ‘timeline’ on Facebook, in which the events in a person’s life are being recorded, and considered to be a source for capturing citizen’s life-events and needs.This research aims to develop a mechanism to advertise e-government services to citizens by using social media based on the life-event approach. Accordingly, the Social Media - Norm-Based Life-Event (SM-NoBLE) system is implemented with a mechanism for extracting citizen’s life-events from citizen interactions with social media. Then, it matches life-events with relevant e-services using the Norm-Based Life-Event (NoBLE) framework and the concept of norms borrowed from organisational semiotics for the matching mechanism. This research creates a case study of Saudi Arabia to apply the SM-NoBLE system to evaluate accuracy and functionality.

Life Events and Personality Traits in Obsessive-Compulsive Neurosis

1984 ◽  
Vol 144 (2) ◽  
pp. 185-189 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Mckeon ◽  
Bridget Roa ◽  
Anthony Mann
Keyword(s):  
Personality Traits ◽  
Life Events ◽  
Obsessive Compulsive ◽  
Premorbid Personality ◽  
Life Event ◽  
Control Subjects ◽  
Standard Assessment ◽  
Event Score

SummaryTwenty-five patients with obsessive-compulsive neurosis and matched controls had their life event scores (Paykel's Life Event Schedule) rated for the year prior to the onset of illness and the date of interview, respectively. The Standard Assessment of Personality Schedule, whose high inter-temporal and inter-informant reliability was confirmed, was used to rate the patients' premorbid personality.The obsessive-compulsive patients' mean life event score was significantly higher than the control subjects; and this excess spanned the six months prior to the onset of illness. Patients with abnormal personality traits (obsessional, anxious and self-conscious) experienced significantly fewer life events than those without such traits.

Prenatal exposure to maternal stressful life events and earlier age at menarche: the Raine Study

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
E V Bräuner ◽  
T Koch ◽  
A Juul ◽  
D A Doherty ◽  
R Hart ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Stress ◽  
Life Events ◽  
Prenatal Stress ◽  
Stressful Life Events ◽  
Maternal Stress ◽  
Stressful Life Event ◽  
Stressful Life ◽  
Age At Menarche ◽  
Complete Case ◽  
Life Event

Abstract STUDY QUESTION Is there an association between prenatal exposure to stressful life events and age at menarche, and does childhood BMI mediate this association? SUMMARY ANSWER Girls exposed to prenatal stress had a slightly earlier age at menarche, but this association did not show a dose-response effect and was not mediated by childhood offspring BMI. WHAT IS ALREADY KNOWN Prenatal stress may impact on reproductive function in females including age at menarche, but human data are very limited. High childhood BMI is known to be associated with earlier age at menarche. Only one small study has measured the association between maternal stress and age at menarche and reported that childhood BMI mediated the association between maternal stress and earlier age at menarche. However, neither maternal stress nor age at menarche was prospectively recorded and the study was limited to 31 mother–daughter pairs. STUDY DESIGN, SIZE, DURATION The Raine Study is a large prospective population-based pregnancy cohort study (n = 1414 mother–daughter pairs) continuously followed from prenatal life through to adolescence. In the present study, we examined the association between exposure to maternal stressful life events during early, late and total gestation and age at menarche in offspring using 753 mother–daughter pairs with complete case information. PARTICIPANTS/MATERIALS, SETTING, METHODS Mothers prospectively reported stressful life events during pregnancy at 18 and 34 weeks using a standardized 10-point questionnaire. Exact date of menarche was assessed using a purpose-designed questionnaire at 8, 10, 14 and 17 years of age. Complete information on exposure, outcome and confounding variables was obtained from 753 mothers–daughter pairs. Multivariate linear regression complete case analysis was used to examine associations between maternal stressful life event exposure and age at menarche. Potential selection bias was evaluated using multiple imputations (50 datasets). The mediating effects of offspring childhood BMI (ages 5, 8, or 10 years) on these associations were measured in separate sub-analyses. MAIN RESULTS AND ROLE OF CHANCE Most (580/753, 77%) daughters were exposed to at least one prenatal stressful life event. Exposure to maternal stressful life events during the entire pregnancy was associated with a non-linear earlier age at menarche. Exposure to one event and two or more psychological stressful events was associated with a 3.5 and 1.7-month earlier onset of puberty, respectively when compared to the reference group with no exposure maternal stressful life events. The estimates from multiple imputation with 50 datasets were comparable with complete case analysis confirming the existence of an underlying effect. No separate significant effects were observed for exposure during early or late gestation. The association between prenatal stressful events and age at menarche was not mediated by childhood BMI in the offspring. LIMITATIONS, REASONS FOR CAUTION Stressful life events may have affected pregnant women in different ways and self-perceived maternal stress severity may have provided a more precise estimate of gestational psychological stress. The observed non-linear U-shape of the association between maternal psychological stress and age at menarche did not reflect a dose-response. This suggests that the first exposure to prenatal stress exerts a greater effect on fetal reproductive development. A potential mechanism is via dramatic initial activation of the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis following the first stressful life event which is greater than that observed following subsequent exposure to two or more maternal stressful life events. Whilst we adjusted for a priori chosen confounders, we cannot exclude residual confounding or confounding by factors we did not include. Maternal age at menarche was not available so the effects of familial history/genetics could not be assessed. There was a large loss due to the number of girls with no information on date of menarche and missing confounder information implying risk of selection bias and multiple imputation analyses did not fully exclude this risk (similar direction but slightly weaker estimate magnitude). WIDER IMPLICATIONS OF THE FINDINGS Menarche is a sentinel reproductive event and earlier age at menarche carries implications for psychological, social and reproductive health and for long-term risk of common non-communicable diseases. Understanding the factors regulating age at menarche has extensive health implications. This is the first population-based cohort study in humans to demonstrate that prenatal psychological stress might directly modify age at menarche. STUDY FUNDING/COMPETING INTEREST(S) Dr. Bräuner and Trine Koch’s salaries were supported by Doctor Sofus Carl Emil Friis and spouse Olga Doris Friis foundation, The Danish Cancer Society (Kræftens Bekæmpelse, RP15468, R204-A12636, Denmark) and The Danish Health Foundation (Helsefonden, F-22181-23, Denmark). Martha Hickey was funded by NHMRC Practitioner Fellowships. The funding bodies played no role in the design, collection, analysis, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript; or in the decision to submit the manuscript for publication. Dr. Hart has received personal fees in his function as the Medical Director of Fertility Specialists of Western Australia and received educational sponsorship grants from MSD, Merck-Serono and from Ferring Pharmaceuticals. Dr Hart has also received personal fees from Shareholders in Western IVF outside the submitted work. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER NA.

Comparability and Short-Term Stability of Techniques to Assess Extension of Thinking about One's Personal Future

1983 ◽  
Vol 56 (2) ◽  
pp. 559-564 ◽  
Author(s):  
William Rakowski ◽  
Clifton E. Barber ◽  
Wayne C. Seelbach
Keyword(s):  
Data Collection ◽  
Life Events ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Life Event ◽  
Term Stability ◽  
The Future ◽  
Changes Over Time ◽  
Over Time

Three techniques for assessing extension of one's personal future (line-marking, open-ended report, life-events) were compared in a sample of 74 respondents. Two points of data collection were employed to examine short-term stability. At both administrations, correlations among indices suggested that techniques were only moderately comparable. Short-term stabilities were variable; correlations ranged from .42 to .79. Across subgroups of the sample, the direct, open-ended report of extension showed the greatest stability, while life-event extension showed the least. Apparently, extension of thinking about the future should be assessed by more than one technique to investigate potential relationships with other variables or changes over time in perspective about the future.

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