For the third sentence (nicotine), it seems a natural consequence of nicotine creating strong feelings, which would be appealing to schizophrenics who have blunted affect in general (see discussion of “Negative symptoms” above), and aversive to autistic people who are feeling overstimulated in general (see my autism post).
this feels precisely backwards to me. I use nicotine because it reduces hypersensitivity and the downstream effect of reducing that hypersensitivity is that it reduces my psychotic symptoms. Nicotine doesn’t seem at all to “create strong feelings” to me, it does the reverse and blunts strong feelings, it makes the world less intense and more tolerable. So, I really don’t think it’s acting on the negative symptoms of schizophrenia, I think it’s acting on the positive symptoms.
(It’s now on my to-do list to look into / think about the nicotine connection more carefully. Meanwhile, I have added a warning to that part of the OP. )
this feels precisely backwards to me. I use nicotine because it reduces hypersensitivity and the downstream effect of reducing that hypersensitivity is that it reduces my psychotic symptoms. Nicotine doesn’t seem at all to “create strong feelings” to me, it does the reverse and blunts strong feelings, it makes the world less intense and more tolerable. So, I really don’t think it’s acting on the negative symptoms of schizophrenia, I think it’s acting on the positive symptoms.
Interesting!! Thanks for sharing!!
(It’s now on my to-do list to look into / think about the nicotine connection more carefully. Meanwhile, I have added a warning to that part of the OP. )