Psychiatric Disorders: Common Types and Symptoms

What is a Psychiatric Disorder?

A psychiatric disorder is a mental illness diagnosed by a mental health professional that significantly disturbs your thinking, moods, and/or behavior and increases your risk of disability, pain, death, or loss of freedom. The symptoms must be more severe than a normal response to an upsetting event, such as grief after losing a loved one.

Common Types of Psychiatric Disorders:

1. Neurodevelopmental Disorders:

   • Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
   • Autism spectrum disorders

2. Schizophrenia Spectrum and Other Psychotic Disorders:

   • Detachment from reality
   • Delusions, hallucinations, disorganized thinking, and speech

3. Bipolar and Related Disorders:

   • Episodes of mania (excessive excitement, activity, and energy) alternating with periods of depression

4. Depressive Disorders:

   • Persistent feelings of sadness, worthlessness, and reduced interest in activities
   • Major depressive disorder, persistent depressive disorder (PDD)

5. Anxiety Disorders:

   • Excessive and unrealistic worry and fear
   • Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), panic disorder

6. Obsessive-Compulsive and Related Disorders:

   • Repeated and unwanted urges, thoughts, or images (obsessions)
   • Compulsions to perform specific actions in response to obsessions
   • Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)

7. Trauma- and Stressor-Related Disorders:

   • Develop during or after stressful or traumatic life events
   • Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), acute stress disorder

8. Dissociative Disorders:

   • Disruptions in sense of self, identity, and memory
   • Dissociative identity disorder

9. Somatic Symptom and Related Disorders:

   • Distress and physical symptoms with no clear medical cause
   • Illness anxiety disorder

10. Feeding and Eating Disorders:

    • Disturbances related to eating
    • Anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder

11. Elimination Disorders:

    • Inappropriate elimination (release) of urine or stool
    • Bedwetting (enuresis)

12. Sleep-Wake Disorders:

    • Interference with a person's ability to get adequate sleep
    • Insomnia disorder

13. Sexual Dysfunctions:

    • Disorders of sexual response
    • Premature ejaculation, erectile disorder, female orgasmic disorder

14. Gender Dysphoria:

    • Distress associated with a person's desire to be a different gender

15. Disruptive, Impulse-Control, and Conduct Disorders:

    • Difficulty with emotional and behavioral self-control
    • Kleptomania, intermittent explosive disorder

16. Substance-Related and Addictive Disorders:

    • Problems associated with excessive use of alcohol, drugs, or gambling

17. Neurocognitive Disorders:

    • Affect thinking and reasoning
    • Delirium, Dementia

18. Personality Disorders:

    • Lasting pattern of emotional instability and unhealthy behaviors
    • Borderline personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder

19. Paraphilic Disorders:

    • Sexual-interest disorders
    • Sexual sadism disorder, voyeuristic disorder, pedophilic disorder

20. Other Mental Disorders:

    • Psychiatric disorders due to other medical conditions or not meeting criteria for other groups

Symptoms of Psychiatric Disorders:

• Confused thinking
• Reduced ability to concentrate
• Ongoing sadness or feeling "down"
• Difficulty managing day-to-day stress and problems
• Trouble understanding situations and others
• Withdrawal from activities and others
• Extreme tiredness, low energy, or sleep problems
• Intense fear, worry, or guilt
• Rapid mood swings
• Delusions, paranoia, or hallucinations
• Changes in eating habits and sex drive
• Drug or alcohol abuse
• Excessive anger, hostility, or violence
• Suicidal thoughts

When Does a Mental Health Concern Become a Psychiatric Disorder?

Unlike time-limited mental health concerns, psychiatric disorders are ongoing and significantly impact daily life, causing distress to the individual and those around them. They interfere with the ability to perform day-to-day tasks.