Athymhormic syndrome, or psychic akinesia, is a rare neurological

Neurology

Neurology is a medical specialty dealing with disorders of the nervous system. Specifically, it deals with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of disease involving the central, peripheral, and autonomic nervous systems, including their coverings, blood vessels, and all effector tissue,...

 syndrome

Syndrome

In medicine and psychology, a syndrome is the association of several clinically recognizable features, signs , symptoms , phenomena or characteristics that often occur together, so that the presence of one or more features alerts the physician to the possible presence of the others...

 characterized by extreme passivity, apathy

Apathy

Apathy is a state of indifference, or the suppression of emotions such as concern, excitement, motivation and passion. An apathetic individual has an absence of interest in or concern about emotional, social, spiritual, philosophical or physical life.They may lack a sense of purpose or meaning in...

, blunted affect, and a profound generalized loss of self-motivation and conscious thought. For example, a patient with this syndrome might sustain severe burns on contact with a hot stove, due to lacking the will to move away despite experiencing severe pain. The existence of such symptoms in patients after damage to certain structures in the brain

Brain

The brain is the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals—only a few primitive invertebrates such as sponges, jellyfish, sea squirts and starfishes do not have one. It is located in the head, usually close to primary sensory apparatus such as vision, hearing,...

 has been used to support a physical model of motivation

Motivation

Motivation is the driving force by which humans achieve their goals. Motivation is said to be intrinsic or extrinsic. The term is generally used for humans but it can also be used to describe the causes for animal behavior as well. This article refers to human motivation...

 in human beings, wherein the limbic loop of the basal ganglia

Basal ganglia

The basal ganglia are a group of nuclei of varied origin in the brains of vertebrates that act as a cohesive functional unit. They are situated at the base of the forebrain and are strongly connected with the cerebral cortex, thalamus and other brain areas...

 is the initiator of directed action and thought.

The word Athymhormic

Athymhormia

Athymhormia is a disorder of motivation, one of that class of neuro-psychiatric conditions marked by abnormalities or deficiencies in motivation. Symptoms include the loss or reduction of desire and interest toward previous motivations, loss of drive and the desire for satisfaction, curiosity, the...

 is derived from the Greek

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...

 , which means mood or affect, and , which means impulse, drive, or appetite. First described by French

French people

The French are a nation that share a common French culture and speak the French language as a mother tongue. Historically, the French population are descended from peoples of Celtic, Latin and Germanic origin, and are today a mixture of several ethnic groups...

 neurologist Dominique Laplane in 1982 as ""PAP syndrome" , the syndrome is believed to be due to damage to areas of the basal ganglia

Basal ganglia

The basal ganglia are a group of nuclei of varied origin in the brains of vertebrates that act as a cohesive functional unit. They are situated at the base of the forebrain and are strongly connected with the cerebral cortex, thalamus and other brain areas...

 or frontal cortex, specifically the striatum

Striatum

The striatum, also known as the neostriatum or striate nucleus, is a subcortical part of the forebrain. It is the major input station of the basal ganglia system. The striatum, in turn, gets input from the cerebral cortex...

 and globus pallidus

Globus pallidus

The globus pallidus also known as paleostriatum, is a sub-cortical structure of the brain. Topographically, it is part of the telencephalon, but retains close functional ties with the subthalamus - both of which are part of the extrapyramidal motor system...

, responsible for motivation and executive functions. It may occur without any preexisting psychiatric

Psychiatry

Psychiatry is the medical specialty devoted to the study and treatment of mental disorders. These mental disorders include various affective, behavioural, cognitive and perceptual abnormalities...

 condition.

Symptoms

It is characterized by an absence of voluntary motion without any apparent motor deficit, and patients often describe a complete mental void or blank. This is accompanied by reduced affect or emotional concern (athymhormy) and often by compulsions

Compulsive behavior

Compulsive behavior is behavior which a person does compulsively—in other words, not because they want to behave that way, but because they feel they have to do so....

, repetitive actions, or tic

Tic

A tic is a sudden, repetitive, nonrhythmic, stereotyped motor movement or vocalization involving discrete muscle groups. Tics can be invisible to the observer, such as abdominal tensing or toe crunching. Common motor and phonic tics are, respectively, eye blinking and throat clearing...

s. After stimulation from the outside, such as a direct command, the patient is able to move normally and carry out complex physical and mental tasks for as long as they are prompted to continue.

The symptoms may be differentiated from depression because depression requires the existence of sadness or negative thoughts, while athymhormic patients claim to have complete lack of thoughts, positive or negative.

See also

• Athymhormia
  Athymhormia
  Athymhormia is a disorder of motivation, one of that class of neuro-psychiatric conditions marked by abnormalities or deficiencies in motivation. Symptoms include the loss or reduction of desire and interest toward previous motivations, loss of drive and the desire for satisfaction, curiosity, the...
  
  
• Progressive supranuclear palsy
  Progressive supranuclear palsy
  Progressive supranuclear palsy is a degenerative disease involving the gradual deterioration and death of specific areas of the brain....
  
  
• Huntington's disease
  Huntington's disease
  Huntington's disease, chorea, or disorder , is a neurodegenerative genetic disorder that affects muscle coordination and leads to cognitive decline and dementia. It typically becomes noticeable in middle age. HD is the most common genetic cause of abnormal involuntary writhing movements called chorea...
  
  
• Akinetic mutism
  Akinetic mutism
  Akinetic mutism is a medical term describing patients who tend neither to speak nor move . It is the result of severe frontal lobe injury in which the pattern of inhibitory control is one of increasing passivity and gradually decreasing speech and motion.An example of a cause of this disorder...
  
  
• Aboulia
  Aboulia
  Aboulia or Abulia , in neurology, refers to a lack of will or initiative and is one of the Disorders of Diminished Motivation or DDM. Aboulia falls in the middle of the spectrum of diminished motivation, with apathy being less extreme and akinetic mutism being more extreme than aboulia...