Is my neighbour schizophrenic?

How would I know if my neighbour was schizophrenic?

It is an interesting question.

It isn't like I can just ask him, he might take that as a grave insult. (What if becomes even more paranoid and thinks I am watching him?)

I think I would have to look at his symptoms and behaviour.

While moving into our apartment my girlfriend and I learned that our neighbour was a bit of a jerk. (I am paraphrasing here, the other neighbours we met described him using a word that starts with A and ends with hole.)

So I found a list of schizophrenia symptoms...

• Social withdrawal
• Hostility or suspiciousness
• Deterioration of personal hygiene
• Flat, expressionless gaze
• Inability to cry or express joy
• Inappropriate laughter or crying
• Depression
• Oversleeping or insomnia
• Odd or irrational statements
• Forgetful; unable to concentrate
• Extreme reaction to criticism
• Strange use of words or way of speaking

So social withdrawal and hostility fits the jerk description. But what about his insistence that he hears banging noises (see my previous post on this topic) coming from our apartment?

Schizophrenic people sometimes hear voices. But noises???

So I tried googling that and found the following page:

http://www.schizophrenia.com/family/delusions.html

Which had this written on it:

"In the acute phases of schizophrenia, patients are likely to insist they are hearing voices that no one else can hear. Sometimes they hear noises, clicks or non-word sounds. On occasion they are disturbed by seeing, smelling or feeling things that others do not."

So... yeah. Apparently acute schizophrenia can cause people to hear noises. Like banging for example.

I know for example that I can sometimes hear music in my head. I know there is no actual sound there, but I am thinking about so strongly it feels like I can actually hear it.

But banging noises? Nope. That is crazy talk right there.

So as far as I can tell my crazy neighbour is suffering from acute schizophrenia and is delusional to the point that he is hearing sounds that are not really there.