Posts Tagged ‘Is anxiety inherited’
May 18th, 2010
Here are 8 short documentary’s on anxiety,depression, and stress, in video number 8 he talks about Is Anxiety Inherited, do we have an anxiety gene?
Is Anxiety Inherited, he is not saying a definite no to this, but what i feel he is saying is, that the behaviour is learnt.
Tags: anxiety, anxiety cures, Anxiety disorder, Dealing with anxiety, Is anxiety inherited
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May 11th, 2010
It has been a known fact for many years that anxious parents can pass anxiety disorders on to their children. Although this truth is well known, no one is prepared to say yes to this question “is anxiety inherited“. But now, a new study by the scientists at Johns Hopkins Children’s Centre, came up with the conclusion that a family-based program where parents and children are being treated together, can reduce the symptoms and risks of anxiety among these children.
Each person can get fearful from time to time, but when the problem starts taking over one’s life, the condition is then called anxiety disorder. It can be extremely stressful and stop people from living their lives fully. Some individuals with anxiety disorder may also have phobias and develop panic attacks. For the study purposes, the Hopkins investigators looked at 40 children from the ages between 7 and 12 years. The kids were not diagnosed with anxiety disorder themselves but all of them had at least one parent who was diagnosed with the condition.
What other proof do we really need to answer the question “is anxiety inherited“. Researchers randomly split the participants into two groups, with 20 of the children and their families taking part in an 8-week cognitive behavioural therapy program, while the other 20 were put on a waiting list and did not receive any treatment during the period of the study, but were offered therapy one year later. The CBT program, which consisted of one-hour-long weekly sessions, was focusing on an improvement of problem-solving skills, instruction about anxiety disorder, as well as helped parents discover and change behaviours believed to contribute to anxiety in the children.
The chief researcher of the study, Dr. Golda Ginsburg, PH.D., a child psychologist at Hopkins Children’s Centre and an associate professor of psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, said that according to the statistics gathered by the experts, the children of parents with an anxiety disorder are up to seven times more likely to develop the disorder themselves, and up to 65 per cent of kids who live with an anxious parent meet the criteria for anxiety disorder.
The results of the experiment revealed that within a period of 12 months, 30 per cent of the children who did not participate in the program, had developed an anxiety disorder, compared to none of the children who were enrolled in the family based therapy. A 40 per cent decrease in anxiety symptoms in the year after the therapy program were independently reported by parents along with investigators who analyzed the behaviour of the kids and their parents. There was no drop of anxiety symptoms observed among children on the waiting list.
The parental behaviours personalized with therapy program included overprotection, excessive criticism and excessive expression of fear and anxiety in front of the kids. The program targeted childhood risk factors such as avoiding anxiety-provoking situations and anxious thoughts. According to a recent editorial in The New England Journal of Medicine, it is deterrence and not treatment, of childhood anxiety, that is of a primary importance, because anxiety disorders affect one in every 5 children in the United States, but very often are left unrecognized. If not addressed in time, the dilemma can lead to depression, substance abuse and poor academic performance throughout childhood years and way into adulthood.
Results of the study will be published in the June issue of the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology. The study was funded by the US government’s National Institute of Mental Health. So “is anxiety inherited“, yes. Can we change the pattern of behaviour yes!
Tags: about anxiety symptoms, anxiety, anxiety causes, anxiety cures, Anxiety disorder, Anxiety Symptoms, Coping with anxiety, Fear, Health, Is anxiety inherited, Mental health
May 4th, 2010
Can it aid a few of us if we had the answer to this question “is anxiety inherited”? I’m not certain. It might help us come to terms with the fact that we suffer with anxiety.
Have you looked at your family history, parents, grandparents and maybe even further back? Or have you grown up with a family member suffering from anxiety? My mother suffered quite badly with anxiety, mainly when she was going through the change. Her anxiety caused her to become house bound, resulting in her leaving her job on health grounds.
I don’t remember looking back at my younger years my mum suffering with anxiety. But she did. Just because I cannot recall it. It does not insinuate that I did not pick up on it. The dilemma for me is, that since she was suffering with anxiety, I might of picked up that learnt behaviour, without really knowing what it was. Hence back to the big question “is anxiety inherited”, well it may well not of been in my actual genes, but I could of learnt the anxiety behaviour from my mum. I have had some great debates with associates on this subject matter.
Like how come I have anxiety and my three brothers and my sister do not suffer with anxiety. Certainly that would show that anxiety is not inherited. However on the other hand I have to have learnt it from somebody? My anxiety has been labelled as “free floating anxiety”, so I don’t know what I become anxious about, but I do know I have anxiety.
So understandably I must have learnt that behaviour from somewhere. The reason this is so significant to me is, I if I learnt this behaviour, then I can work on learning a fresh way of becoming. I can work on the reality that this is the behaviour of my Mother and not me. It was something that I picked up while I was growing up. It does not belong to me; I borrowed it from my Mum. I did not appreciate what I was picking up on. But I picked up on the anxiety my mum was suffering from and stored it away ready for the right situation to manifest in my life for it to materialize and be part of my life.
For me “is anxiety inherited”, yes, as a learnt behaviour, not as something that is permanent in my life.
Tags: about panic attacks, anxiety, anxiety phobias, Dealing with anxiety, Is anxiety inherited
April 28th, 2010
Is anxiety inherited, what do you reason? For me I do not believe so. I feel some of us are born into a lineage where there is anxiety and panic attacks. But that does not imply that we will have anxiety.
Talking from my individual personal experience my Mum had anxiety and I’m not a 100% sure but I think my Dad was a pretty nervous guy. So yes it was in my family. But i have four siblings and none of them suffer from anxiety or panic attacks. I am additionally a Sagittarius and it sounds as if we are prone to be anxious people. As a result this could also be a contributing factor.
As soon as I had my first attack of anxiety I did ask my Doctor the question “is anxiety inherited”, he was not certain. As far as he was concerned there was no proof either way. So I consider there is no definitive answer to the question “is anxiety inherited”.
I truly consider that there is no such thing as an anxiety gene within us. I do believe that we can pick up on the behaviours of those close to us when we are growing up. So I feel we can have learnt behaviour. Which is something wholly different to anxiety?
As children we may have witnessed somebody near to us having an anxiety attack and not in reality understood what was going on. But what we would of picked up, was the fear they where feeling. And if it was a close relative who was acting afraid, then we would really be afraid, as we looked to them to keep us secure. But we would not of understood there fear.
So there may be an case for anxiety being a learnt behaviour, but as for the question “is anxiety inherited”, I am not persuaded. Although it would be really helpful at times to know where my anxiety came from. And yes when i was feeling down it would of been quite helpful to have somebody to blame and be angry with. But again that’s just part of the process, well it was for me. The not knowing or understanding was really frightening. It would of been helpful for me to have the doctor say, yes your anxiety is inherited,at least then i might of least understood my anxiety better.
What do you think? Please leave a sensible comment to the question “is anxiety inherited”. I would really value your input.
Tags: anxiety, Coping with anxiety, Dealing with anxiety, Is anxiety inherited, Panic attacks and anxiety attacks