Physiological causes of Schizophrenia?

My mother suffers from mild schizophrenia and I was told that it is caused by hyperactive secretion of dopamin. Isn't dopamin one of the hormones that function in pleasurable feelings? How is it related to cognition?

Schizophrenia is caused by an increase in the amount of dopamine within different pathways in the brain. These pathways are fairly complex, which makes it hard to explain in just a few sentences, but I'll try.

Excess dopamine in the mesolimbic pathway is felt to cause the positive symptoms of schizophrenia, including delusions and auditory or visual hallucinations. Dopamine in the mesocortical pathway is thought to cause the negative symptoms, including social withdrawal, flattening of affect, and decreased speech.

Most antipsychotic medications target these 2 pathways to decrease the effect of dopamine and in turn decrease the positive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia.

Schizophrenia is also felt to be caused by an imbalance of serotonin as well, and the newer antipsychotics target both dopamine and serotonin receptors and seem to be more effective with fewer side effects.

There is a delicate balance between many many neurotransmitters in the brain, and they all play very important roles in normal functioning. However, when the balance is skewed in one direction or another, there is a multitude of things that can happen.

Hope this answer was helpful, and good luck to you and your mom! :)

Nobody knows the cause .

Brain scans show loss of brain mass.