GENERAL ANXIETY DISORDER

General anxiety disorder is characterized by excessive and uncontrollable worry about everyday things. The frequency, intensity, and duration of the worry are disproportionate to the actual source of worry, and such worry often interferes with daily functioning. It affects approximately 5% of the total population, yet is more prevalent in women and much more prevalent in youth, where 12% to 20% are affected. People with general anxiety disorder often have a variety of symptoms such as tension, being startle easily, restlessness, hyperactivity, worrying, fear, and rumination.

In youth general anxiety disorder often leads too lower levels of social supports, academic underachievement, underemployment, substance use and high probability of obtaining other psychiatric disorders. General anxiety disorder differs from other anxiety disorders in the sense that there is no clear stimulus that elicits anxiety or was associated with how it began. It also lacks the clear avoidance and escape behaviors of phobias and unlike panic attacks associated with most disorders, general anxiety disorder stays fairly moderate in its anxiety levels.