Parental expressed emotion and psychophysiological reactivity in an adolescent sample at risk for schizophrenia spectrum disorders.

The correspondence between interview-assessed parental emotional attitudes toward a particular offspring (expressed emotion [EE]) and the psychophysiological reactivity of both parents and their children during a series of direct family interactions was investigated for a sample of 52 disturbed but nonpsychotic adolescents (aged 14–29 yrs). Parents who expressed an excessive number of critical comments during the interview were designated as high EE, and the remainder were designated as low EE. Both high-EE parents and their adolescent offspring became significantly more psychophysiologically reactive as the 1st of 2 family confrontations in which they participated progressed. Adolescents also showed greater arousal when anticipating interactions with a high-EE parent when that parent was first in the experimental sequence. These results are combined with those of a previous study by the authors and J. A. Doane (see record 1984-06985-001) to support the notion that the EE measure is marking clearly defined family emotional climates that appear to be related to the subsequent onset of schizophrenia spectrum disorders in this adolescent sample. (14 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)