Schizotypal personality traits and attitudes towards Hinduism among Balinese Hindus

The study explored the relationship between schizotypal personality traits and attitude of Hindus towards their faith. A total of 309 Balinese Hindus responded to the Santosh–Francis Scale of Attitude towards Hinduism, the Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire Brief, and a number of external indicators and religious practices. Attitude towards Hinduism, frequency of prayer, and temple attendance had a rather weak positive relationship with each other, while prayer behaviour exhibited negative low-to-moderate relationships with schizotypal traits. A hierarchical multiple linear regression model identified the disorganised elements of schizotypy as the primary predictor of the attitude towards Hinduism. Finally, age showed negative associations with schizotypy and positive ones with Hinduism, while women were less schizotypal and had more positive attitude towards their faith than men. These findings suggest the presence of both underlying cross-faith elements and the strong influence of faith- and culture-specific forces on the relationship between religiosity and schizotypy.     

Re-expanding the phenomenology of hallucinations: lessons from sixteenth-century Spain

The paradigm within which hallucinations are studied, and the explanatory frameworks employed, may bias the phenomenological analysis of these experiences. After introducing the new term, hallucination, this paper undertook an inter-disciplinary study of the phenomenology of hallucinations identified by the sixteenth-century theologians, St John of the Cross and St Teresa of Avila. It was examined whether the phenomenological properties they highlighted are identified and addressed by contemporary psychological research. Many of these properties were indeed found to be acknowledged and studied by contemporary research in psychiatric patients, as well as in healthy individuals during hypnagogia, near-death experiences and at times of stress. However, many experiences, such as “internal voices,” “soundless voices,” and “voices that save,” were found to be neglected by contemporary research, as was the potential for hallucinations to communicate novel/original information. Finally, it was examined how these phenomenological insights may be “front-loaded” into future experimental designs.     

Missed post-hospitalisation clinic appointment in a psychiatric hospital in Southeast Nigeria

ABSTRACT

Patients who have been attended to at psychiatric institutions sometimes fail to keep their scheduled appointments. This study was designed to assess the extent and determinants of missed first clinic appointments among recently discharged patients with schizophrenia. A total of 311 inpatients with a diagnosis of schizophrenia were participated in the study. The diagnosis of schizophrenia was confirmed using Munich version of the Composite International Diagnostic Interview. Socio-demographic and clinical data were collected using the socio-demographic questionnaire while analysis was done using SPSS (version 16). The rate of missed first outpatient appointment was found to be 25.7%. Missed appointment was associated with male gender, state of origin outside the study site, long distance from hospital to place of abode, longer appointment duration and illness severity at discharge. The findings in this study support the need for the introduction of community psychiatric services to improve patient access to services in Nigeria.     

The Simple Copy Task: Detecting Higher Order Visual Processing Deficits in Schizophrenia,Dementia, and Movement Disorder Groups

The Simple Copy Task (SCT) is a figure copying test with inherent appeal due to its short administration time, graded task difficulty, varied stimuli, and potential to eliminate floor effects. Despite this, there is a lack of data regarding its construct validity and diagnostic utility. The present study compared SCT performance of schizophrenia (n = 29), dementia (n = 64), and movement disorder (n = 12) groups with that of unmatched healthy control participants (n = 49). Movement disorder patients committed a high degree of misplacement errors, whereas dementia patients tended to omit items, add extraneous detail, and perseverate. The schizophrenia group was most similar to the dementia group in their performance on the SCT, committing primarily omission and perseveration errors. The SCT was most closely related to the Rey Complex Figure Task (r = 0.68, p < .01) and the Block Design Task (r = 0.62, p < .01). Age (r = ?0.14, p < .01) and education (r = 0.35, p < .01) effects were present; however, there was no impact of gender and handedness. Taken together, these findings provide support for the utility of the task and directions for clinical interpretation.     

Experiencing malevolent voices is associated with attentional dysfunction in psychotic patients

Inattention in people with schizophrenia is common. However, there has been little research on the association between inattention and auditory hallucinations. The aim of the study was to investigate how inattention is affected by beliefs about voices as benevolent and malevolent and perceived control of voices. A total of 31 patients who experienced auditory hallucinations and who met the criteria for schizophrenia or other psychosis completed the attention subscale of the Scale for the Assessment of Negative Symptoms (SANS) and the Connors’ Continuous Performance Test II (CCPT‐II). The revised Beliefs About Voices Questionnaire (BAVQ‐R) was used to assess malevolent and benevolent beliefs about voices, and severity of auditory hallucinations (the Psychotic Symptom Rating Scales; PSYRATS) was used to assess perceived control of voices and frequency of voices. Levels of depression (the Beck Depression Inventory; BDI), anxiety (the Beck Anxiety Inventory; BAI), severity of overall psychiatric symptoms (the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale; BPRS), and severity of negative symptoms (SANS) were assessed to control for their potential confounding effects. The relations between the variables were explored with correlations and multiple hierarchical regression analyses. The results indicated that more malevolent, but not more benevolent, beliefs about voices predicted lower levels of attention, independently of general psychiatric symptoms and various other psychotic symptoms such as frequency of and perceived control of voices. These findings suggest an important relationship between malevolent beliefs about voices and levels of inattention. The possible impact of changing beliefs about voices to improve attentional functioning is discussed.     

Psychiatry and religion: a perspective on meaning

ABSTRACT

A Position Statement on Spirituality and Religion in Psychiatry was issued by the World Psychiatric Association in 2016. Among many recommendations, this statement underscores the need for research on both religion and spirituality in psychiatry, especially on their clinical applications. In this contribution we will put light on the issue of meaning and meaning-making, i.e., an important field for every human, Particularly for individuals suffering from severe mental disorders. After an introduction about meaning in its religious/spiritual dimension, we will describe what needs to be studied in order to get a better knowledge as to how patients cope with meaning, and how they process (in terms of meaning-making) the outburst of a severe mental disorder such as schizophrenia.     

Mentoring for Mental Health within a University: A psychodynamic approach

This paper explores the role of mentoring in a British University for students with mental health issues and is written from the perspective of the Mentor who is also a Psychodynamic Psychotherapist. Psychodynamic theory is applied to two case studies in order to understand the conscious and unconscious factors when considering these students’ particular learning difficulties and motivation for entering a learning environment. In the first case study, it is suggested that the student hopes to find his lost father within the containing bricks of the institution. When confronted with frustration and disappointment, he mobilises schizoid defences, precipitating a psychotic episode. The second case study formulates the student’s chronic procrastination, which verges on academic sabotage, as a defence against the unbearable guilt concerning his abilities and achievements in contrast with his unsuccessful and disabled siblings. The challenge of helping these students is explored, including the approaches taken by the Mentor, given her remit and the particular issues presented by the students.     

Cognitive-behavioural treatment of pathological gambling in individuals with chronic schizophrenia: a pilot study

The current study aimed to test the clinical effectiveness of a cognitive-behavioural program (CBT) specifically adapted for pathological gamblers with chronic schizophrenia, carried out in a naturalistic setting of community Mental Health Centres. Forty-four pathological gamblers with chronic schizophrenia were assigned either to a standard drug therapy for schizophrenia (control group) or to cognitive-behavioural therapy for pathological gambling plus a standard drug therapy for schizophrenia (experimental group). Psychological treatment comprised a 20-session program including psychoeducation, stimulus control, gradual exposure and relapse prevention. Therapeutic success was defined as abstinence or the occurrence of only 1 or 2 episodes of gambling during the follow-up period. While the patients treated in the experimental group showed a rate of success of 73.9%, only 19% of the participants belonging to the control group gave up gambling at the 3-month follow-up. The CBT group also did better than the control group in the number of gambling episodes and in the amount of money spent on gambling. However, the improvement of the experimental group was weaker at the 6- and 12-month follow-up. These findings support the beneficial effects of CBT as adjunctive therapy for patients with dual diagnoses (schizophrenia and pathological gambling).     

催眠恢复偏执型精神分裂症患者自知力的研究

为探讨精神分裂症的成因和治疗,对病程由初发至25年不等的23例偏执型精神分裂症患者,使用催眠进行了研究性治疗。实验结果是19例痊愈,4例无效。患者在催眠下均报告出曾有强烈的心因性事件发生和在悲伤的情绪下三至五天的失眠史,并在失眠后出现现在的症状。提示催眠是与精神分裂症患者沟通的治疗手段,还似乎提示精神分裂症是心因性疾病。     

Behavioral assessment of auditory processing deficits in schizophrenia: Literature review and suggestions for future research

During the last decades, a considerable number of studies about auditory processing deficits in schizophrenia have been published, some of them using the term of Auditory Processing Disorder (APD). Due to heterogeneous methodology and inconsistent results concrete conclusions may not be straightforward. We focused on studies that used at least one behavioral test for the assessment of auditory processing in schizophrenia, in order to identify new evidence on auditory processing deficits in schizophrenia, and to consider fields for future research. 28 studies met inclusion criteria and are presented in this review. The articles were divided into three groups, those that implemented a test battery approach, those that used only Dichotic Listening (DL), those that used DL along with imaging or electrophysiology techniques. Most of the studies that implemented a test battery showed significant performance differences between patients and controls. This indicates APD presence. Due to the limited number of studies implementing a test battery, this is not conclusive. The majority of all studies that used a DL task showed that patients' performance or laterality was significantly lower than that of controls. Age, duration of illness, total and specific positive symptoms seem to affect significantly DL performance and auditory laterality. The results support the existence of various schizophrenia subgroups that differ in their auditory processing performance, and also have structural and functional specificities. Further research in the field is needed, especially studies that implement a test battery, and studies that examine possible correlations between clinical variables and auditory processing deficits.