The biological basis of mental illness with regard to affective disorders

This thesis aims to provide a comprehensive overview of current biological hypotheses and manifestations of mental illness with an emphasis on affective disorders. Mood disorders are the third most common mental disorder and lifelong perspective affects almost one-fifth of the population. For this reason, their etiology is important issue for the prevention, treatment and subsequent rehabilitation. Bachelor thesis puts emphasis on the biological disposition, especially anatomical and physiological abnormalities typical for affective disorders and attempts to classify and structure the existing research findings. The output is a research project that could provide the answer, if it is indeed a significant difference in biological dispositions (and their types) in individuals with emotional disorders and a healthy population. Specifically, the text contains anatomical and neurophysiological description of the structures of the brain that are responsible for the emotional state of a person, the clinical picture of affective disorders and an overview of approaches to their genesis. The following is dedicated to individual biological hypotheses, which results in the research question, that deals with the design of empirical investigation