Mental disorders are mental patterns or anomalies that often result in distress or disability. Specialists usually identify mental disorders based on a combination of a person’s feelings, actions, thoughts, and perceptions. Often, such disorders are associated with particular regions of the brain that perform specific functions. Based on several studies conducted in the past, there is a certain continuum between mental health and mental illness, and more than a third of people around the world go through at least one mental disorder once in his life. Causes of mental disorders differ from one person to another, and so are treated differently. In fact, science maintains that mental health conditions vary across cultures and that these conditions affect one’s social being in one way or another. Psychiatric hospitals treat patients with mental disorders based on the root cause of the disorder, though most of them are carried out through simple methods such as observation and questioning. Most of the mental disorders known today have known methods of treatment, but there are also some that remain incurable. That explains why many health institutions today include prevention in the mental health strategies that they provide to their patients. Here is a list of the top 10 unknown mental disorders today:
10. Cotard’s Syndrome or Walking Corpse Syndrome
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Cotard’s Syndrome is often dubbed as the “Walking Corpse Syndrome” because people who have this mental disorder definition actually believe that they are dead or do not exist. This mental disorder is often associated with Capgras’s Syndrome, which refers to another mental disorder in which the patient believes that someone important in his life has been replaced with an imposter. Cotard’s Syndrome involves a sort of disconnect between the area of the brain that recognizes faces, and the area of the brain that associates emotions with that recognition.
9. Body Identity Integrity Disorder
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Body Identity Integrity Disorder refers to a mental disorder wherein a person feels that life would be a lot better if he were an amputee. Though many people get that kind of feeling sometime in their lives, the difference with this disorder is that the feeling is so overwhelming that the patient actually has an urge to amputate his body limbs just to confirm the truth behind that feeling. The cause of this disorder remains unknown up to this day, though many psychologists associate it with somatoparaphrenia. Hence identifying the mental disorder symptoms is a great help to combat the growing effects of it.
8. Synesthesia
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A person with Synesthesia experiences an alternate sense resulting from the first sense. This mental disorder results from the neural wires of the brain getting crossed, so he experiences a particular sense as another sense. This mental disorder symptom is not really a bad thing per se. Psychologists believe that it actually stems from one’s deeper understanding of art, or a different perception of something that already exists. Some of the famous personalities who once had this disorder are Pharrell Williams and Duke Ellington.
7. Windigo Psychosis
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Identified by psychologists as a culture-bound syndrome, Windigo Psychosis is a mental disorder wherein a person has an insatiable craving for human flesh despite his fear of becoming a cannibal and despite the availability of other food sources. The name of this disorder was taken from Algonquin mythological character named Wendigo, a cannibalistic spirit who had the capacity to possess humans. Scientists believe that this mental disorder assessment is not purely neurological but spans from the spiritual to the physical.
6. Genital Retraction Syndrome
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Genital Retraction Syndrome (GRS) is characterized by one’s fear that his external genitals are actually shrinking or retracting into the body to the point of disappearing completely. This mental disorder anxiety is not only applicable to men but also to women who fear that their breasts would shrink to the point of complete disappearance. Some people who have this disorder have additional fears that their genital retraction would not just result in the lack of sex life but in their untimely death.
5. Foreign Accent Syndrome
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Foreign Accent Syndrome is a mental disorder that is said to result from a severe brain injury such as stroke or severe head trauma. People who have this mental disorder syndrome speak with a new-found accent that is totally uncharacteristic of their local accent. The most famous sufferer of this syndrome is Cindy Lou Romberg, a woman from Washington who suffered from a severe brain injury and began speaking with a convincing Russian accent after her recovery.
4. Trichotillomania
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Trichotillomania (TTM) is a mental disorder that involves a person feeling the urge of literally pulling her hair off her scalp, including her facial hair, eyelashes and pubic hair. This mental disorder definition is often associated with obsessive compulsive disorder because of its habitual nature. However, Trichotillomania is a compulsive disorder that brings unparalleled feeling of comfort to the patient as she performs all her hair-pulling rituals. Some people who are afflicted with this disorder also suffer from Rapunzel Syndrome after consuming all the hair that they pull out until their stomach is unable to digest everything.
3. Mary Hart Syndrome
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Mary Hart Syndrome was first identified in 1991 after a woman fell into seizures after hearing the voice of Mary Hart, one of the hosts of “Entertainment Tonight.” One of the popular people who suffered from this syndrome is Cosmo Kramer, who shared how he got dizzy and hit his head on top of a coffee table after hearing the voice of Mary Hart. This mental syndrome anxiety is often said to be some sort of “sound induced epilepsy.”
2. Paris Syndrome
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Paris Syndrome is an exclusive mental disorder syndrome that is experienced by tourists who visit Paris. Historically, people suffer from extreme culture shock and experience literal mental breakdown when they go to Paris because their expected view of Paris and the actual view of Paris are at both ends of the line. Around 12 Japanese tourists suffer from this syndrome every year.
1. Jumping Frenchmen of Maine
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Jumping Frenchmen of Maine is a mental disorder that is characterized by an extreme response to a startling noise or sight, such as flailing arms widely and repeating back phrases uncontrollably. This disorder is often linked to Tourette’s syndrome which is another mental disorder characterized by nonsensical outbursts. This is the number one mental illness on this list of top 10 unknown mental disorders in the world.