The Early Course of Schizophrenia

This volume is unique in adopting a lifespan approach to understanding schizophrenia. There are many aspects of schizophrenia that require research attention from a lifespan perspective. For example, there may be aspects of the behavior or biological functioning that are present before the illness that change an individual’s risk for developing the illness. There may be environmental events that can cause schizophrenia in the absence of other predisposing factors. There may be genetic influences on the development of schizophrenia that are modified by environmental events, either psychological or physiological. Factors such as an individual’s gender or intelligence may also influence schizophrenia, either in terms of changing the risk for development or changing aspects of the illness’ presentation, such as onset age or overall functional outcome.