Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

OCD is biological and psychological.

No research has yet determined the precise cause of OCD. However, obsessive-compulsive behavior is treated as a psychiatric condition that some researchers believe may have both neurobiological and psychological features (Steinberger & Schuch, 2002, p. 97). Most researchers would likely agree that the disorder occurs when one part of the brain has difficulty communicating with another part (Postgraduate Medicine, 2003, p. 91). In some studies, this difficulty in communication has been linked to the absence of sufficient supplies of an internal biochemical substance called serotonin, which operates as a messenger in the brain (Postgraduate Medicine, 2003, p. 91). Other researchers have also hypothesized that OCD and other anxiety-related disorders occur when the brain or other internal biochemical substances (neurotransmitters such as nerepinephrine, serotonin and dopamine) that help individuals prepare for danger malfunction (Valente, 2002, p. 125). Neurotransmitters contr

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s "thought action fusion," depression, and anxiety-proneness could make a child more vulnerable to OCD (De Silva & Marks, 2001, p. 179). Generally, OCD affects children's cognitive processes by forcing a subjectively felt compulsive urge to perform specific cognitive acts. Most OCD children try to ignore or suppress their obsessions (Adams & Burke, 1999, p. 2). Without proper psychiatric treatment, however, children are most often unable to control their obsessive thoughts. Many children begin to fear that they are going crazy. Still, many of them realize that what they are thinking is irrational or, in children's terms, "silly" or "stupid" (Adams & Burke, 1999, p. 2). OCD children are bombarded with images that they cannot ignore. These images make it difficult, if not impossible, for the child to focus on activities that are unrelated to the obsession. In fact, the child's attempts to dismiss the obsessive images only increases their frequency (De Silva & Marks, 2001, p. 173). These time-consuming images lead OCD children to believe that there is something they "have to do," forcing children to perform the overt behaviors or mental acts triggered by the obsessive images (De Silva & Marks, 2001, p. 173) and thereby inter
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Approximate Word count = 3234
Approximate Pages = 13 (250 words per page)

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