These symptoms can mimic exactly the signs of a heart attack. The patient experiences a vicious cycle of pain and anxiety. Further physical symptoms can include dizziness, restlessness and irritability (Brown, Barlow & Liebowitz, 1994).
While some researchers suggest that GAD can run in families, GAD still strikes many people from different walks of life. It often strikes in the late teens or early 20's. Sometimes it can present in later years but rarely is it for the first time. The symptoms of GAD may manifest themselves over a long period of time. Studies indicate that it strikes approximately 4% of the population and women are affected twice as often as men (Schwartz, 2000). .
The causes of GAD are unclear, and theories of its development and etiology reflect the varied strains of psychology. Psychoanalysts believe that GAD is caused by a conflict between the ego and the id. They theorise that the ego suppresses the id's sexual impulses, preventing them from breaking though to the surface, because it fears the punishment that might occur. However, the ego is only partly successful in its suppression. The sexual impulses remain unconscious but the fear of punishment does not, resulting in a person that is fearful and apprehensive but does not know why (Swartz, 2000). Behaviourist theory, on the other hand, theorises GAD as a form of classically conditioned fear that differs from a simple phobia in its generality. Sufferers of GAD are always fearful as they are always encountering feared stimuli (Wolpe, 1982 in Schwartz, 2000). Unfortunately, most cases of GAD cannot be traced to a single traumatic event. For this reason cognitive-behavioural theorists have moved the focus from external feared stimuli to internal ones (Westling and Ost, 1995 in Schwartz, 2000). Specifically, cognitive-behavioural theorists propose that sufferers of GAD fear a loss of control or helplessness. All three types of theorists believe that GAD develops only when there is some form of precondition that may be inherited or acquired (Swartz, 2000).