Affect lability
Affect lability or affective lability (also mood lability ) is the designation for a mental state in which minor stimuli cause rapid and strong fluctuations in the basic mood . In contrast to affect incontinence , the affected person is aware of the mood fluctuation, but does not experience it as embarrassing or pathological.
Characteristics
The emotionally unstable person reacts excessively to affects offered or provoked in the conversation and reacts to them unchecked. The rapid change of affect (e.g. from anger to sadness, from sadness to joy), the short duration of affect and the multiple affect fluctuations are typical. The patient no longer succeeds in differentiating the emotions arriving from outside, he is no longer able to control his emotions .
Occurrence
- normal stage of development in children
- normal personality trait in adults in passive situations (cinema, television)
- Postpartum Depression (Baby Blues)
- Premenstrual Syndrome (PMS)
- Personality Disorders , especially in Emotionally Unstable and Borderline Personality Disorders , and Histrionic Personality Disorder
- Mania and less pronounced in hypomania
- Choleric temper
- impulsiveness
- Cyclothymia , mixed manic-depressive states
- symptomatic psychosis
- early stages of schizophrenia
- incipient cerebral damage
- Symptom of dementia (e.g. Alzheimer's dementia )
- Attention Deficit / Hyperactivity Disorder
Affect lability can also be caused by organically caused psychological disorders.
therapy
The symptoms of emotional lability can vary according with the basic disease addition antidepressants will be treated (for. Example, SSRI, SNRI). There are also attempts at therapy with mood stabilizers ( lithium , carbamazepine , valproate ).
Individual evidence
- ↑ Entry on affect lability in Flexikon , a wiki of the DocCheck company , accessed on November 27, 2015.
