In these disorders, patients focus prominently on somatic (ie, physical) complaints. Thus, somatization typically leads patients to seek medical evaluation and treatment rather than psychiatric care. Somatic symptom disorder involves focusing too much on physical symptoms such as pain or tiredness. This focus causes major emotional distress and makes it hard to function. You may or may not have another medical condition that causes these symptoms. But how you think, feel and behave because of the symptoms can be extreme. Somatization is the generation of somatic symptoms due to psychological distress, often coinciding with a tendency to seek medical help for them. [1][2] The term somatization was introduced by Wilhelm Stekel in 1924. What Is Somatization? Somatization refers to the tendency to experience and express psychological distress through physical symptoms. The meaning of SOMATIZATION is conversion of a mental state (such as depression or anxiety) into physical symptoms; also : the existence of physical bodily complaints in the absence of a known medical condition. Somatization is the expression of psychological or emotional factors as physical (somatic) symptoms. For example, stress can cause some people to develop headaches, chest pain, back pain, nausea. When mental factors such as stress cause physical symptoms the condition is known as somatisation. Somatoform disorders are a severe form of somatisation. Somatic symptom disorder (SSD formerly known as somatization disorder or somatoform disorder ) is a form of mental illness that causes one or more bodily symptoms, including pain. A trusted reference in the field of psychology, offering more than 25,000 clear and authoritative entries. Somatization occurs when emotional distress manifests as physical symptoms, creating a complex mind-body connection that requires comprehensive treatment.