Mapping how schizophrenia changes brains

Living with a mental illness such as schizophrenia is confronting, both for the person who has it and their loved ones.

The behaviour of those who have schizophrenia can be troubling, and can include hearing voices, extreme paranoia about being followed in public, or beliefs that friends and family are conspiring against them. Suffers can experience hallucinations, delusions and disorganised behaviour.

But the disorder also involves substantial impairment to cognitive (thinking) skills that are crucial for occupational and interpersonal functioning, such as memory, attention, learning, decision making and reasoning.