512209-13-5LO AID: 5766 | 7/3/2017
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Schizophrenia is a serious mental disorder and chemical imbalance in the brain is one of the accepted reasons for schizophrenia. And in this regard of chemical imbalance, a detailed study has been conducted on the neurotransmitter dopamine. The hypothesis on dopamine was given in 1960, and it was framed on 3 important observations.
Firstly, a drug by the name Chlorpromazine was used to treat patients of schizophrenia. And the drug was found to be very effective. Subsequently, it was found that chlorpromazine was effective because it had a blocking effect on dopamine receptor cells.
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Second, a drug called Amphetamine produced effects which appeared like paranoia and auditory hallucinations. It was understood that the brain responded to this drug the way it responded to excess of dopamine. So, it was concluded that the drug Amphetamine stimulated to functional increase in the levels of dopamine. As a result the patient went into a state of psychosis which was similar to schizophrenia.
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Thirdly, the evidence of dopamine being linked to schizophrenia came when patients were given drugs that triggered the production of dopamine in the brain. Studies have figured out that deregulated transmission of dopamine caused aberrant salience. As a result of this a person tries to make sense of every small irrelevant experience. Every experience in the background becomes important and worthy of thought. Hence, a schizophrenic person perceives any noise or arrival of anything as a threat to life. And he/she starts seeing things which do not exist in reality.
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An excess of dopamine in the system comes when its metabolism is slowed down and more of it is released at the synapse. Sometimes it is also recycled back into the neuron. Thus, studies have proved that neurotransmitter dopamine in excess makes a person schizophrenic.