“If schizophrenia were actually the result of a dominant gene, 75% of the children should develop schizophrenia,” according to the book Schizophrenia: The Epigenetic Puzzle.

More than genes must be involved. The authors of Mind, Mood, and Medicine surmise: “It is well known that psychological experience​—for example, battle stress—​can profoundly affect the chemical, hormonal, and physiological functioning of the body. In psychiatric illnesses, a psychological experience can frequently be identified as the precipitating factor in a vulnerable person.” And where might the genes fit in? Continue Drs. Wender and Klein: “Our overall view is that genetic factors may make an individual vulnerable to certain forms of psychological experience.” So while schizophrenia itself may not be inheritable, the predisposition to it may very well be.

Abnormal Brains

Schizophrenia Bulletin presents yet another piece of the puzzle: “The evidence presented suggests that the brains of schizophrenic patients frequently contain abnormalities.”

Dr. Arnold Scheibel claims that in the section of the brain called the hippocampus, nerve cells in normal patients are aligned “almost like little soldiers.” But in the brains of some schizophrenic patients “the nerve cells and their processes are completely awry.” This, he believes, could account for the hallucinations and delusions of the schizophrenic. Other schizophrenics have been found to have enlarged brain cavities. Most intriguing of all is the discovery that the brains of the mentally ill may contain biochemical defects! (See the following article.)

To date, though, no single brain abnormality or biochemical defect has been found to be common to all schizophrenics. Doctors thus believe that schizophrenia may well be “many disorders, with a multitude of different causes.” (Schizophrenia: Is There an Answer?) A slow-acting virus, vitamin deficiencies, metabolic disturbances, food allergies​—these are just a few of the factors claimed to be involved in schizophrenia.

But though the exact cause and mechanism of the disease elude medical science, Dr. E. Fuller Torrey says: “Schizophrenia is a brain disease, now definitely known to be such. It is a real scientific and biological entity as clearly as diabetes, multiple sclerosis, and cancer are scientific and biological entities.” There is also evidence that depressive disorders are similarly linked to biology.

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A number of factors may be involved in the onset of mental illness

Genetics?

Environment?

Brain abnormalities?

Chemical defects?

Diet?