Stability of formal thought disorder and referential communication disturbances in schizophrenia.

This study examined the degree to which different types of communication disturbances in the speech of 48 schizophrenia patients and 28 controls were variable and state related versus stable and traitlike. Clinically rated formal thought disorder and 5 types of referential disturbance showed substantial stability within participants over time. The sixth type of referential disturbance, the vague reference, was not stable over time. Formal thought disorder was associated with the severity of core psychotic symptoms in patients, whereas referential disturbances showed little or no association with positive or negative symptom severity. Furthermore, changes in psychotic symptoms over time were accompanied by corresponding changes in formal thought disorder but not referential disturbances. These results support the idea that some types of referential disturbances are traitlike and may be reflective of vulnerability as well as manifest illness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Affective reactivity of speech in schizophrenia patients and their nonschizophrenic relatives.

This study compared levels of referential communication disturbance in speech samples from 41 stable schizophrenia outpatients, 46 parents of patients, and 23 nonpsychiatric control participants in affectively positive versus affectively negative conditions. The speech of the patients and parents showed elevated frequencies of reference failures in the affectively positive condition compared with control participants; the speech of the patients became more disordered in the affectively negative condition, whereas the speech of the parents did not. These results support the idea that referential communication disturbances reflect vulnerability, as well as overt illness, but that affective reactivity of these disturbances is associated mainly with the manifest illness. These findings are consistent with biological, cognitive, and psychological theories about the processes underlying stress responsiveness of schizophrenic symptoms more generally. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interleukin-1 inhibits Leydig cell steroidogenesis without affecting steroidogenic acute regulatory protein messenger ribonucleic acid or protein levels

This study compared levels of referential communication disturbance in speech samples from 41 stable schizophrenia outpatients, 46 parents of patients, and 23 nonpsychiatric control participants in affectively positive versus affectively negative conditions. The speech of the patients and parents showed elevated frequencies of reference failures in the affectively positive condition compared with control participants: the speech of the patients became more disordered in the affectively negative condition, whereas the speech of the parents did not. These results support the idea that referential communication disturbances reflect vulnerability, as well as overt illness, but that affective reactivity of these disturbances is associated mainly with the manifest illness. These findings are consistent with biological, cognitive, and psychological theories about the processes underlying stress responsiveness of schizophrenic symptoms more generally.     

Communication deviance, attention, and schizotypy in parents of schizophrenic patients

Singer and Wynne's measures of communication deviance were adapted for use with conversational speech and applied to audiotaped speech samples of schizophrenic patients, their parents, and matched nonpsychiatric control subjects. The parents demonstrated levels of language disturbance similar to those of the patients and higher than those of controls. Language deviance in the parents was positively associated with distractibility on a matched-task digit-span measure of attention and with severity scores on a separate schizotypy scale. These findings are discussed with respect to possible cognitive variables underlying the language disturbances and their potential relevance to schizophrenic etiology.     

Cognitive Impairments and Disordered Speech in Schizophrenia: Thought Disorder, Disorganization, and Communication Failure Perspectives.

This article posits that basic cognitive impairments in schizophrenia are more highly related to speech disorder measured as communication failures than speech disorder measured as thought disorder or disorganization. The author tested 47 schizophrenia patients and 36 control participants for sustained attention, sequencing, and conceptual sequencing ability. Their speech was also rated for communication failures, thought disorder, and conceptual disorganization. Attention and sequencing impairments, examined hierarchically, explained a substantial 38% of the variance in the communication measure of speech disorder but little of the variance in formal thought disorder or conceptual disorganization. The author concludes that (a) impairments in attention and sequencing abilities contribute substantially to schizophrenic communication failures, and (b) it is important to consider lower level cognitive "3rd variables" when examining higher level cognitive associates of speech disorder. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Visual-Perceptual Dysfunctions Are Possible Endophenotypes of Schizophrenia: Evidence From the Psychophysical Investigation of Magnocellular and Parvocellular Pathways.

Visual information processing is impaired in schizophrenia patients and their biological relatives. The authors measured vernier thresholds in 72 schizophrenia patients, their 86 siblings, and 60 healthy control subjects. Subjects were asked to detect the direction of the horizontal displacement of 2 stimuli (left or right). During magnocellular (M) pathway tests, stimuli were dots with low contrast (5%) or counterphase-modulated gratings (25 Hz). For parvocellular (P) pathway tests, isoluminant blue-red dots with yellow-green background were used. Results revealed that patients with schizophrenia and their siblings were more impaired in M pathway conditions than in P pathway conditions. There was no color-specific impairment. The patients and their siblings displayed lower performances on tests of executive functions, psychomotor speed, and verbal memory compared with the controls. Visual-perceptual and neuropsychological data did not correlate. In conclusion, M pathway dysfunction is a potential endophenotype of schizophrenia. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Hippocampal N-acetyl aspartate in unaffected siblings of patients with schizophrenia: a possible intermediate neurobiological phenotype

BACKGROUND: Shared neurobiological characteristics of patients with schizophrenia and their siblings may represent "intermediate phenotypes" that may more closely reflect the genetic susceptibility underlying this illness. We sought evidence of such phenotypes using magnetic resonance spectroscopy based on previously described regional abnormalities in levels of the neuronal marker N-acetyl-aspartate (NAA) in the hippocampal area and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex of patients with schizophrenia. METHODS: We studied 47 schizophrenics, 60 unaffected siblings, and 66 healthy control subjects with long echo time multislice proton magnetic resonance spectroscopic imaging, primarily measuring NAA, creatine plus phosphocreatine (CRE), and choline-containing compounds. RESULTS: Both patients and their unaffected siblings had significant reductions in hippocampal area NAA/CRE as compared with control subjects. As exploratory analyses, estimates of heritability were performed. Although quantitative correlation of hippocampal NAA between patients and sibs was low (likely reflecting measurement noise), qualitatively defined "low hippocampal NAA/CRE phenotypes" yielded relative risk estimates (lambda s) of between 3.8 and 8.8, suggesting this characteristic is heritable. CONCLUSIONS: Our finding adds to the evidence that hippocampal abnormalities are associated with schizophrenia and may represent a novel biological phenotype for genetic studies of schizophrenia.     

Minor physical anomalies in schizophrenic patients and their siblings

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to assess the frequency and type of minor physical anomalies in schizophrenic patients and their normal siblings. METHOD: Sixty adult patients with schizophrenia, 21 siblings of these patients, and 75 normal comparison subjects were assessed through use of an extended scale consisting of the Waldrop scale and 23 other minor physical anomalies. RESULTS: Patients had significantly more minor physical anomalies than comparison subjects in all body areas tested and also more minor physical anomalies in total than their siblings. Hand, eye, and mouth minor physical anomalies best discriminated patients from comparison subjects. Siblings had significantly more minor physical anomalies than normal comparison subjects. Sixty percent of the patients and 38% of the siblings, but only 5% of the comparison subjects, had a higher rate of minor physical anomalies (i.e., six or more). With the exception of ear minor physical anomalies, no association was found between minor physical anomalies in the patient and sibling in the same family. CONCLUSIONS: Higher levels of minor physical anomalies (especially in the eye, mouth, and hand/foot regions) characterize both schizophrenic patients and their normal siblings, but there is little similarity in these anomalies between patients and siblings in the same family. Thus, one or more genetic or shared environmental factors may increase the risk for development of both minor physical anomalies and schizophrenia in these families at large. Minor physical anomalies associated with schizophrenia are frequently found in, but are clearly not limited to, the head or facial region. The Waldrop scale identifies minor physical anomalies strongly associated with schizophrenia. Nevertheless, assessment of the new items clearly indicates that many additional minor physical anomalies are found in schizophrenic patients.     

Sexual behavior and nonsexual deviance: A sibling study of their relationship.

Analyzed the correlation of nonsexual deviance and physical, sexual behavior using a sibling design. Hypothesized that both types of behavior are partly determined by a latent trait of deviance proneness, d. In two separate studies—one based on an Oklahoma dataset of college students and their siblings, and the other, on the Adolescent Sexuality Project ({adsex}) dataset of high-school students and their siblings in Tallahassee, Florida—found a strong relationship between relatively early sexual intimacy and nonsexual forms of deviance. Siblings were more alike than chance in deviance and in physical sexual behavior. Most critical for the model, there was also an association between one sibling's sexual intimacy with a partner and the other's deviance. Using {lisrel}, tested the latent-trait model statistically and accepted it as consistent with the obtained correlations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comparative affective reactivity of different types of communication disturbances in schizophrenia.

Twenty-nine schizophrenic outpatients provided speech samples on affectively positive and negative topics. These samples were assessed for several different types of communication failures by using the Communication Disturbances Index. Frequencies of overinclusive references, ambiguous word meanings, and ambiguous referents increased in the affectively negative condition; frequencies of missing referents and instances of syntactic unclarity did not change across affective conditions. Degree of overall affective reactivity of speech was associated with severity of the core positive schizophrenic syndrome. These findings support the idea that different types of schizophrenic communication disturbances are associated with different underlying pathophysiological processes, that some are more reactive to affect than others, and that affective reactivity of these symptoms is associated with the positive schizophrenic process. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotional valence and reference disturbance in schizophrenia.

The authors examined the impact of emotional valence on reference disturbance in patients with schizophrenia and identified factors that moderate individual differences in this relationship. Thirty-nine patients with schizophrenia were given an interview that elicited speech samples in response to 10 neutral and 6 negatively valenced emotional questions. Speech samples were analyzed using the Communication Disturbances Index (N. M. Docherty, M. DeRosa, & N. C. Andreasen, 1996). Participants were also assessed with the Positive and Negative Symptom Scale (S. Kay, 1991) and a single-trial Stroop task (Stroop, 1935). Group analyses indicated that negative questions elicited more unclear references than neutral questions. Both the severity of disorganization symptoms and selective attention deficits predicted increased reference errors in response to emotional questions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Vernier Threshold in Patients With Schizophrenia and in Their Unaffected Siblings.

The aim of this study was to investigate magnocellular (M) and parvocellular (P) visual functions in nonmedicated patients with schizophrenia and in their unaffected siblings. Possible abnormalities in cortical integration of retinal receptive fields also were addressed. Twenty-two nonmedicated patients with schizophrenia, their unaffected siblings, and 20 age- and IQ-matched healthy control subjects received 4 vernier acuity tasks (blue-on-yellow, frequency-doubling, achromatic low and high contrast conditions) in which they were asked to detect the spatial alignment of dots and gratings. Results revealed that the patients with schizophrenia and their unaffected siblings showed selective dysfunctions in the frequency-doubling and achromatic low contrast conditions, which were devoted to investigate M pathways. In the isoluminant blue-on-yellow and high contrast achromatic conditions, there were no significant differences between the experimental groups. These results suggest that the deficit of M pathway is an endophenotype of schizophrenia. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Conversational repair in schizophrenic and normal children

OBJECTIVE: Children acquire the skills to monitor the adequacy of their spoken message and to self-initiate repair strategies that modify the message during early, middle, and late childhood. To characterize further the communication deficits of childhood-onset schizophrenia, this study compared self-initiated repair strategies in schizophrenic and normal children and their relationship with formal thought disorder, discourse deficits, and distractibility. METHOD: Measures of self-initiated repair, formal thought disorder, and cohesion were coded in 32 schizophrenic and 47 normal children, aged 5.6 to 12.4 years, from speech samples elicited with the Story Game. RESULTS: The schizophrenic children used some repair strategies (false starts, fillers, referential revision) more infrequently than the normal children. Within the schizophrenic group, the children who were receiving neuroleptic medication underutilized repair and had more discourse deficits than the unmedicated patients. Loose associations and distractibility were associated with increased use of false starts but not fillers. CONCLUSIONS: In addition to formal thought disorder and discourse deficits, schizophrenic children underutilize self-initiated repair when presenting their thoughts to the listener, particularly if they are being treated with neuroleptics, a potential sign of increased clinical morbidity. Impoverished communication skills might reflect negative signs in childhood-onset schizophrenia.     

Significance of sibling constellations for the origin of systematic schizophrenias (author's transl)

In previous examinations of twins the author found that, surprisingly, "systematic schizophrenias" did not occur in identical twins, whereas they did in binovular twins. Even though the term systematic schizophrenia may not be accepted, the results, in any case, remain valid because they are based on a classification that had been defined and described prior to the present investigation. From the findings in twins the question arised as to whether the constellation of siblings who are not twins might also be significant in preventing the outbreak of systematic schizophrenias. Therefore, in a sample of 500 patients examined earlier we stated how many siblings, older siblings, younger siblings, brothers, sisters were to be found in systematic schizophrenias and their special types. There were many findings, in part being statistically significant, in part suggesting, at least, that they be taken into consideration. As a result of the findings it seems clear that sibling constellations are important for the origin of systematic schizophrenias. Thus, whereas psychosocial factors proved prominent, we found the heredity rate especially low in these forms of schizophrenia.     

Communication deviance in families of schizophrenic and manic patients.

Levels of communication deviance (CD) distinguish parents of schizophrenic patients from parents of nonpsychotic patients, but the prevalence of intrafamilial CD in other psychotic disorders has not been examined. Levels of CD were compared across biological parents of schizophrenic (n?=?39) and bipolar manic (n?=?16) patients and across patients themselves. CD ratings were based on Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) protocols (parents only) and family interactions (parents and patients). Total levels of CD did not distinguish between groups of parents or patients. However, instances of odd word usage were more frequent among parents of manic patients than among parents of schizophrenic patients on both CD measures. Also, during the interaction task, odd word usage was more frequent among manic patients, whereas schizophrenic patients made more ambiguous references. Results suggest that high levels of intrafamilial CD are not unique to schizophrenia. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Prepulse-elicited motor reactions do not differ between schizophrenia patients and control subjects.

Electromyographic (EMG) measures were made of the eyeblink response to stimuli 2-16 dB over a 70-dB(A) noise background as well as the eyeblink response to startling 115-dB(A) pulses in 15 schizophrenia patients and 10 control subjects. In patients and in control subjects, weak stimuli did not elicit EMG activation. Startling stimuli elicited robust EMG activation in both groups. Compared with control subjects, schizophrenia patients are not more sensitive to motor-activating effects of weak acoustic stimuli that served as prepulses in published reports of prepulse inhibition deficits in schizophrenia. Thus, differential sensitivity to the motor-activating effects of prepulses should not contribute to reduced prepulse inhibition in schizophrenia patients versus control subjects. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Annoyance perception of sound and information extraction

The judgment of annoyance of distorted speech differs radically for different language groups. The results show that those who do comprehend a spoken language, base their annoyance-judgments on the informational content extracted while those who do not base it on the perceptual characteristics of meaningless sound (particularly loudness). A series of distorted German speech sounds were presented to two subject groups consisting of native Swedish and English speakers, and the results were compared with earlier results from groups of native German and Polish subjects. The 50 stimuli were generated from the very same speech signal distorted in two principle ways, either with repeated silent gaps or superimposed noise impulses. The perceived annoyance of the distorted speech was judged both by category scaling for all subject groups, and as a control for "ceiling" effects, also by magnitude estimation for the Swedish and the English subjects. There is a pronounced tendency for German subjects to judge the German speech distorted with silent gaps as more annoying than that distorted with superimposed noise impulses. In contrast, the Swedish, English, and Polish subjects judged the two German-speech distortions in reversed order with regard to annoyance. Thus for noncomprehending listeners, noise-distorted speech is more annoying but for comprehending listeners it is speech distorted by gaps. This means that impaired communication intrusiveness rather than loudness predominates in annoyance judgments from comprehending listeners.     

Disturbances caused by noise in offices

Noise measurements were carried out in 57 offices. At the same time 228 employees were asked about their opinion on the noise situation. Relations between objective and subjective criteria, noise values and complaints about disturbance caused by different types of noise were analyzed. Noise parameters comprising noise peaks are more adequate to assess disturbing noise than parameters based on a mean noise level. Statements on extent and frequency of disturbance in general and of communication depend on noise. Statements on disturbances of concentration and on impairment of performance do not depend on noise. Outdoor noise and "subjectively worst noise" are measurable in dB values; indoor noise, however, is independent from the measured values.