ABSTRACTS

This is one of a series of research studies comparing parents and siblings of 30 schizophrenics with 30 neurotics. The parents of schizophrenics had a greater incidence of schizophrenia, personality disorders, and borderline disorders than did the normals. The siblings of the schizophrenics showed more varied disturbance than the parents. Of 30 schizophrenic families, 14 were "schizmatic" and 7 were "skewed"; 10 families were chaotic, 11 were rigid, 6 showed both patterns, and three were atypical. The families from which schizophrenics come are usually disturbed both genetically and environmentally.     

Some aspects of verbal conditioning in psychiatric patients

Using a modification of a verbal conditioning technique reported by Tafiel (1955) it was found that only schizophrenics and normals showed evidence of conditioning, neurotics and depressives showing changes not differing from chance. There was greater evidence of conditioning among Ss aware of the contingency between response and reinforcement, and some tentative evidence for relationships of anxiety and extraversion with verbal conditioning.     

Relationships between the Test of Attentional and Interpersonal Style and psychiatric subclassification

Examined the ability of a self-report measure of attentional and interpersonal characteristics to discriminate between groups of psychiatric patients and normal controls. Seventy-eight psychiatric patients and 30 nonpsychiatric medical inpatients completed the Test of Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS). Discriminant analyses of TAIS scores showed that: (a) psychiatric patients in comparison with normal controls described themselves as more overloaded by external and internal stimuli and as less effective in narrowing their attentional focus to task-relevant stimuli; (b) good premorbid schizophrenics appeared more externally overloaded and less able to narrow attentional focus than poor premorbid schizophrenics; and (c) psychotics and neurotics described themselves as more introverted and less pleasant in social encounters, while individuals diagnosed as character or personality disorders tended to be more extroverted and impulsive. The results were compatible with past experimental work and clinical reports identifying attentional and interpersonal differences among psychiatric subgroups.     

The Draw-A-Person Test and Process-Reactive Schizophrenia

The Draw-A-Pcrson test was administered to three matched groups of 32 male Ss each: reactive schizophrenics, process schizophrenics, and normal control subjects. Patients were rated for prognosis using the Premorbid Subscale of the Phillips Scale. Drawings were rated by two judges on 80 diagnostic signs culled from the literature. No signs were found to significantly differentiate reactive and process schizophrenics, and only three signs significantly differentiated normals from schizophrenics. It was concluded that a sign approach to the DAP is insensitive to the reaction-process dimension of schizophrenia, and of only limited value in differentiating between normals and schizophrenics in general.     

Mueller-Lyer illusion and size estimation performance in schizophrenics compared to normal controls

A size estimation (SE) paradigm and the Mueller-Lyer (ML) illusion were used to examine perceptual disturbances in schizophrenics. 35 reliably diagnosed (DSM III-R) schizophrenics were compared to 20 subjects with no history of psychiatric illness. Perceptual distortions found in previous studies of schizophrenics were only to a certain extent confirmed in the present results. More overestimators were found among the schizophrenics than among the normals on the SE task. The schizophrenics, first of all the chronic patients, also proved to be more prone to the Mueller-Lyer illusion. A reason why the very clear differences between schizophrenics and normals found in previous examinations were not confirmed in the present study, might be that a reliable diagnostic instrument was for the first time used in this kind of study.     

Communication deviances in parents of schizophrenics

In an attempt to make a multimethod assessment of communication deviance in parents of schizophrenics, a communication conflict situation (CCS) and the TAT were used to obtain qualitative and quantitative measures of communication for a sample of 50 parental couples, 21 of which were parents of schizophrenics, 9 were parents of nonpsychotic psychiatric patients, and 20 were parents of normals. The results were a general confirmation of earlier reports that communication deviance is an outstanding characteristic in families with a schizophrenic offspring. The most important finding, however, was that parents of paranoid and nonparanoid schizophrenics score very differently on a majority of the communication variables. Parents of nonparanoid schizophrenics form one extreme on a continuum of communication deviance, and parents of paranoid schizophrenics and normals the other. Egocentrism, measured by CCS, turned out to be the single qualitative variable with best discriminating power across all groups.     

Body Image Disturbance in Schizophrenia: A Study of Arms and Feet

This study investigated the significance of omitting arms/hands and legs/feet on the Draw-A-Person Test (DAP) in 128 hospitalized schizophrenic and 104 normally functioning adult males. The DAP was administered according to Machover's instructions, and the data were analyzed by chi-square tests. It was found that schizophrenics demonstrated significantly more omissions of arms/hands and legs/feet than the normals. These findings were interpreted to indicate body image disturbance in schizophrenia and were related to Schilder's and Federn's theories of the disorder emphasizing an impairment of ego boundaries.     

Does heart rate differentiate neurotic from normal people in a conditional reflex test?

This study is to compare heart reactivity between normals and anxiety neurotic patients. Five male and five female patients with anxiety neurosis and four male and five female normal persons were submitted to classic delayed conditional reflexes with different probabilities of reinforcement (shock), to a defensive instrumental conditional reflex, and to a neutral nonreinforced stimulus. The basal heart frequency was higher in neurotics and in women than in normals and men. The conditional stimulus (CS) associated with a shock generally produced a bradycardia in normal individuals and in neurotic men, but a tachycardia in neurotic women (effects most pronounced in cases with 100% shock probability). The instrumental CS caused a tachycardia in all of the groups, with highest values in neurotic women. The neutral stimulus produced bradycardia in all persons. The aftereffect of the light stimulus depended on whether a shock was administered and on the CS. The differences between neurotics and normals are explained as caused by the heightened excitatory level of the CNS of the neurotic group, produced by the unspecific activating effect of chronic anxiety, and differences of plastic processes in both groups, resulting in different effects of phasic anxiety on the heart. Complex inhibitory-excitatory interactions of the sympathetic and the vagal system underlying the heart rate changes may be assumed. Possible mechanisms leading to sex differences are discussed.     

Speech competence of children vulnerable to psychopathology

Verbal productivity and cohesion and reference patterns of children of schizophrenics (N=23), unipolars (N=43), bipolars (N=38), and normals (N=53) were assessed using the Rochester and Martin (1979) evaluation system. Children of all offspring groups could be discriminated from one another, with children of schizophrenics showing the most deviant speech performance across all dependent measures. Children of schizophrenics were less verbally productive and had poorer patterns of cohesion between ideas than children of normals. In addition, they produced more unclear and ambiguous references to previously mentioned ideas than did children of normals. The consistency of deviance and performance on specific dependent variables in these children at risk for schizophrenia was similar to the speech performance of thought-disordered schizophrenics. Possible explanations for these similarities were discussed and evaluated.This research was supported by grant number MH21145 from the National Institute of Mental Health and by funds from the William T. Grant Foundation. The authors would like to thank Lina Jandorf for her invaluable assistance in data collection and scoring.     

Self-repair in dialogues of schizophrenics: effects of hallucinations and negative symptoms.

This paper concerns the discourse features of verbal hallucinations and negative symptoms of schizophrenia. A total of 46 schizophrenics, varying in verbal hallucination and in negative symptoms status, and 22 controls were tested on the Reporter Test. The frequency with which they issued inadequate instructions, attempted to repair the inadequacies, and the success of repairs were compared. We observed that schizophrenics, on the whole, issued more wrong and incomplete instructions. This was in part related to their worse working memory, but it was not affected by verbal hallucinations or negative symptoms. We observed, further, that schizophrenics had no particular problems monitoring messages for inadequacies. We did find, however, that schizophrenics with verbal hallucinations had a specific problem with self-repairing wrong instructions. We interpret these results in the framework of Hoffman's (1986b) plan disruption-based model of verbal hallucinations; the Frith (1987) and Frith and Done (1988) internal monitoring model of positive and negative symptoms; and finally Frith and Frith's (1990) model of negative and positive schizophrenia and we use the results to specify the models.     

ABSTRACTS OF LITERATURE

To test the hypothesis that there would be significant differences in the families of schizophrenics, borderlines, neurotics, and non-neurotic psychiatric controls, a sample of six control families who had not had psychiatric treatment and fifty families who had had a child hospitalized for "emotional disturbance" were given the MMPI. Of the 50 patients, 23 were schizophrenic, one manic-depressive, 16 borderline, and 10 neurotic. None was hospitalized at the time of data collection. Using multivariant statistical profile similarities, there were no differences among either the fathers, mothers, or siblings of the offspring in the four diagnostic groups. It was concluded that these families could not be differentiated on the basis of self-reports of psychiatric symptoms.     

Two-flash threshold, sensitivity and β in normal subjects and schizophrenics

Two-flash threshold, response criterion, and sensitivity (defined by the slope of the psychophysical ogive), were examined in schizophrenics and in normals under three conditions--a base-line condition, and during and after continuous white noise. Schizophrenics were subdivided into four groups on the basis of whether or not they exhibited paranoid symptomatology and electrodermal orienting responses. In general schizophrenics had more lenient two-flash response criteria than normal subjects. In the base-line condition schizophrenics with orienting responses had lower two-flash thresholds than those without orienting responses. Paranoid schizophrenics had more lenient criteria than non-paranoid schizophrenics and lower sensitivity than the non-paranoid group with orienting responses. Differential group effects were obtained during and after noise, especially with regard to sensitivity.     

Affect in early memories of borderline patients

Psychoanalytically oriented observers using the framework of object relations theory noted that patients with borderline personality organization manifest serious pathology in their capacity to use internalized imagery to cope with the vicissitudes of separation-individuation. This study examined one source of such imagery, the affect associated with a specific sample of early memories, including the earliest recollections of parents. Patients with borderline personality disorder were compared with paranoid schizophrenics and patients with neurotic character pathology. Forty-five outpatients, 15 in each group, participated in the study. It was found that borderline patients had significantly fewer positively toned early memories than neurotics or paranoid schizophrenics. Only the neurotic group, had a majority of affectively positive memories. The results are generally consistent with object relations theories of borderline psychopathology.     

Qualitative and Quantitative Szondi Diagnosis

Psychoanalytically oriented observers using the framework of object relations theory noted that patients with borderline personality organization manifest serious pathology in their capacity to use internalized imagery to cope with the vicissitudes of separation-individuation. This study examined one source of such imagery, the affect associated with a specific sample of early memories, including the earliest recollections of parents. Patients with borderline personality disorder were compared with paranoid schizophrenics and patients with neurotic character pathology. Forty-five outpatients, 15 in each group, participated in the study. It was found that borderline patients had significantly fewer positively toned early memories than neurotics or paranoid schizophrenics. Only the neurotic group, had a majority of affectively positive memories. The results are generally consistent with object relations theories of borderline psychopathology.     

The conceptual structure of aphasic and schizophrenic patients in a nonverbal sorting task

Hierarchical and overlapping cluster methods were applied to the sortings of aphasic, nonaphasic brain-damaged, schizophrenic, and normal subjects presented with 30 pictures of animals. The hierarchical structure solutions were most diffuse for the groups of the schizophrenics and the fluent aphasics. The structure for the nonfluent aphasics showed more clarity, but was also deviant from the structures of the normals and the brain-damaged without aphasia. Fluent aphasics but not nonfluent aphasics tended to sort pictures which they could not name into smaller groups. For the nonfluent aphasics, there was a significant correlation between the commonality of the sortings and the severity of aphasic disturbances as measured by the Token Test. The relationship between conceptual disorganization and language impairment seems to be functionally different for fluent and nonfluent aphasics.This research was supported by a research grant from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft.     

Comparison of schizophrenics and normals on a visual search task.

The response times of 16 paranoids, 16 nonparanoids and 16 normals were compared on a search task which required subjects to identify target letters embedded in displays of varying numbers of non-targets. The rate on increase in response times with increased numbers of letters displayed was not markedly different for the various groups, although a derived measure of decision and response-selection time indicated that normals selected responses more rapidly. When compared with normals, schizophrenics seemed to experience more difficulty in response selection and decision than in processing visual stimulus information.     

A deficit of primary affective facial expression independent of bucco-facial dyspraxia in chronic schizophrenics

Abstract

Chronic schizophrenics are known to manifest a deficit of categorisation and recognition of primary emotional facial expression despite intact recognition of face identity. An equivalent deficit of expression of the same primary facial emotions in schizophrenics has not been clearly established. Twenty chronic hospitalised schizophrenics and 20 normals were therefore tested on tasks of facial emotional expression upon verbal command, of facial emotional expression imitation, and of non-affective bucco-facial praxic imitation. Results indicate that chronic schizophrenics do manifest a deficit of facial emotion expression which can best be explained by task parameters, such as verbal cueing of emotions, perceptual recognition, and bucco-facial dyspraxia in decreasing order of importance. The deficit does not appear to result from neuroleptic or anticholinergic medication nor length of hospitalisation or disease.     

Memory in schizophrenia and affective disorders*

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the stability of memory and information processing in schizophrenics and affectively disturbed patients. Twenty-two schizophrenics, eight affectives and 14 normal controls were tested twice, with an interval of approximately one year. Results showed that normals performed better than schizophrenics and affectively disturbed patients on almost all of the cognitive measures. The differences reached a level of significance on a reaction time test, a vigilance task and a long-term memory task. The only measure where the difference did not reach a level of significance was on a short-term memory test. Groups' performance to some extent changed over time on most of the measures, but the changes were not significantly different for different groups.     

Comparison of Beck Depression Inventories-IA and-II in Psychiatric Outpatients

The study of mental representations on projective tests such as the Rorschach has made substantial contributions to our understanding of psychopathology. It is not clear, however, whether the representations of paranoid schizophrenics can be differentiated from those of normals and whether the Rorschach is the best test for such comparison. Object representations on the Rorschach and a role-playing (Johnson & Quinlan, 1980, 1985) test were studied in groups of normal (n = 31) and schizophrenic subjects (divided into paranoid [n = 16], intermediate [n = 11], and nonparanoid groups [n = 16]). Developmental levels of representation on both tests were measured with the widely used system of Blatt, Brenneis, Schimek, and Glick (1976), derived from Werner's concepts of differentiation, articulation, and integration. Generally the groups were not differentiated on these measures on the Rorschach. The role-playing test showed greater discriminatory power than the Rorschach, possibly due to its explicit demand to produce representations of humans in interaction. Results of the role-playing test showed differentiation and integration scores were negatively correlated with measures of psychotic symptoms. Nonparanoids differed from the other three groups on differentiation measures, and paranoid and normal groups scored higher on integration measures than did the intermediate and nonparanoid groups. Paranoid subjects scored higher than nonparanoids on functional articulation and higher than intermediates on perceptual articulation; however, paranoid subjects were not differentiated from normals on any developmental measure. Differences between the schizophrenic sample and normals were explained entirely by the nonparanoid subgroup, supporting the paranoid-nonparanoid distinction and raising questions regarding the nature of the deficit in paranoid schizophrenia.     

Symbiosis and Confirmation Between the Parents of the Schizophrenic

Parents of schizophrenics (N = 17 ) were compared with parents of nonschizophrenic hospitalized patients (N = 14 ) and parents of normals (N = 15 ) on the degree of symbiotic enmeshment and confirmation of individuality in the parental relationship. Symbiosis was divided into six component variables: undifferentiation, dependency, intervention, disapproval of other relationships, separation difficulty, and injunctions. Confirmation was bifurcated into acknowledgment and accommodation. Projective tests (TAT and Make-A-Picture-Story) and interviews were used to measure both variables. The results suggest that mothers of schizophrenics tend to be symbiotically attached to their husbands and view their husbands as forming the same type of attachment to them. Fathers of schizophrenics do not tend to be symbiotically involved with their wives but fail to confirm them. The implications of the results for the family system of the schizophrenic are discussed.