Is a Brain Chemical Imbalance a Mental Illness?

The subject of the relationship of mental illness to brain chemistry is a matter of controversy for religion, alternative medicine and conventional science. The argument boils down to the basic question of how the brain works.

Mysticism

• Many religions hold that the brain is merely a receptacle for the human soul, which leaves the brain as an intact entity upon death. As a result, some religions go so far as to hold that brains cannot, in themselves, be defective unless acted upon by some outside factor such as diet, chemical toxins or physical damage.

Alternative Medicine

• Alternative medicine practitioners offer a bewildering array of models for brain function. These generally include a specific treatment for restoring balance and harmony within the brain.

Neuroscience

• According to neuroscience, the human brain operates through a series of organic-chemical interactions in which neurons and brain cells communicate by firing chemicals across gaps between the cells, and then re-uptaking those chemicals back to the original cells they came from so the cells can be fired again. If those neurochemicals are incorrectly balanced, in short supply or overabundant, or if for some reason the neurochemical that triggers re-uptake is not present in sufficient quantities, the intercellular communication sequence can fail to happen as it should.

Psychiatry

• The practices of psychiatry and psychology are built upon the concept that defects in brain chemistry can be either the cause of mental illness or the result of outside factors like injury, toxins or environmental stresses. The goal of treatment is to restore brain chemistry to a near-normal balance through medication and to help the patient reprogram his own mind to cope with the factors that led to the onset of the symptoms of mental illness.

Pharmacology

• Medication treatment for mental illness is designed to restore chemical imbalances that researchers have connected with specific mental illnesses -- such as low or high serotonin, norepinephrine or dopamine levels. The success of pharmacological treatments in treating mental illness have provided convincing scientific validation of the connection between mental illness and chemical imbalance in the brain.