Affective disturbances in psychometrically defined schizotypy across direct, but not indirect assessment modes

Affective disturbances in social domains are characteristic features and potential vulnerability markers of schizophrenia-spectrum pathology. The present study employed a comprehensive and multidimensional approach to understanding affect in individuals with psychometrically defined schizotypy and the controls. Measures were employed assessing trait and state social affective experiences across direct--involving explicit deliberative responses, and indirect domains--involving implicit, behavioral or otherwise non-deliberative responses. The indirect assessments included a modified Implicit Association Test and computerized lexical analysis of natural speech procured during a laboratory speech task. Our affect measures were also unique in that they allowed for separate measurement of pleasant and unpleasant affect. On all direct trait and "in-the-moment" state measures of social affect, individuals with schizotypy reported dramatically decreased pleasant and increased unpleasant affect compared to controls. This was not the case for the indirect measures, which indicated no significant group differences. This pattern was generally consistent regardless of positive, negative and disorganized schizotypal trait severity. These data suggest that affective deficits in schizotypy reflect deliberative rather than implicit/automatic processes. Implications of these findings are discussed.     

Implicit gambling attitudes in problem gamblers: Positive but not negative implicit associations

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Implicit attitudes (associations) are involved in the generation of substance use behaviors. However, little is known about the role of this automatic cognitive processing in deregulated behaviors without substance use, such as abnormal gambling. This study examined whether problem gamblers exhibit both positive and negative implicit attitudes toward gambling-related stimuli. METHODS: Twenty-five problem gamblers and 25 control participants performed two unipolar (pleasant; unpleasant) Single-Target Implicit Association Tasks (unipolar ST-IAT), in which gambling pictures were associated with either pleasant (or unpleasant for the negative unipolar ST-IAT) or neutral words. Explicit attitudes toward gambling were also recorded. RESULTS: We found in problem gamblers: (i) both positive implicit and explicit attitudes toward gambling; (ii) no negative implicit gambling association; (iii) that only positive explicit attitudes positively correlated with the gambling severity score. LIMITATIONS: (i) the use of only one type of reaction time task; (ii) the use of both words and pictures in a same IAT; (iii) problem gamblers have been compared to non-gamblers instead of being contrasted with healthy non-problem gamblers. CONCLUSIONS: Whereas our gamblers experienced deleterious effects related to gambling, implicit attitude toward gambling remained positive, thus hampering attempts to quit gambling. Possible clinical interventions targeting implicit cognition in problem gamblers were discussed.     

Cross-cultural comparisons of attitudes toward schizophrenia amongst the general population and physicians: A series of web-based surveys in Japan and the United States

Cross-cultural differences in attitudes toward schizophrenia are suggested, while no studies have compared such attitudes between the United States and Japan. In our previous study in Japan (Hori et al., 2011), 197 subjects in the general population and 112 physicians (excluding psychiatrists) enrolled in a web-based survey using an Internet-based questionnaire format. Utilizing the identical web-based survey method in the United States, the present study enrolled 172 subjects in the general population and 45 physicians. Participants' attitudes toward schizophrenia were assessed with the English version of the 18-item questionnaire used in our previous Japanese survey. Using exploratory factor analysis, we identified four factors labeled “social distance,” “belief of dangerousness,” “underestimation of patients’ abilities,” and “skepticism regarding treatment.” The two-way multivariate analysis of covariance on the four factors, with country and occupation as the between-subject factors and with potentially confounding demographic variables as the covariates, revealed that the general population in the US scored significantly lower than the Japanese counterparts on the factors “social distance” and “skepticism regarding treatment” and higher on “underestimation of patients' abilities.” Our results suggest that culture may have an important role in shaping attitudes toward mental illness. Anti-stigma campaigns that target culture-specific biases are considered important.     

Social dysdecorum following severe traumatic brain injury: loss of implicit social knowledge or loss of control?

The purpose of the present study was to investigate two theoretical frameworks for understanding acquired deficits in social behavior in individuals with severe traumatic brain injury (TBI). Recent research has found that brain injury can lead to impairments in implicit processes including social cognition. Impairments in implicit social cognition have been recently advanced as an explanation for acquired social deficits, as implicit social cognition is hypothesized to mediate the processing and understanding of often subtle, nonverbal cues in social interactions. In contrast, the executive dysfunction account posits that deficits in higher order cognitive functions, such as attention, planning ability, and mental flexibility, are the locus for acquired deficits in social cognition and behavior. To test these two theories, 22 participants with severe TBI and 25 matched controls were administered a measure of implicit social cognition (Implicit Association Test, IAT), as well as two measure of explicit social attitudes and a range of executive functioning measures. The TBI participants were found to perform normally on the IAT and explicit measures of gender stereotyping but demonstrated executive deficits. Performance on the IAT and executive functions were correlated. Performance in general did not fit well with the implicit social cognition explanation for social dysdecorum following TBI. More evidence was found to support the executive account.     

A laboratory study of affectivity in schizotypy: subjective and lexical analysis

Affective dysfunction is a defining schizotypy feature; yet the majority of studies examining affective dysfunction have largely relied on self-report of trait affect, which reflects only one dimension of emotional experience. Emerging research has explored a second dimension, state affect, using laboratory manipulation, with most finding that schizotypal participants report experiencing less positive/more negative affect than controls. This study expands upon this topic by examining patterns of state affect in psychometrically identified schizotypy through self-report and lexical expression in reaction to emotionally valenced photos. Overall, the schizotypy group reported less positive/more negative affect across affect induction conditions. Both schizotypy and control groups' affect ratings were similar following the unpleasant stimuli; but the schizotypy group's ratings remained significantly less positive/more negative than the control group following the pleasant stimuli. This pattern suggests that the schizotypy group experienced a deficit in emotional reactivity compared to controls in pleasant situations. The schizotypy group also used a higher percentage of negative words and a lower percentage of positive words in vocalized reactions during the pleasant, but not unpleasant, affect induction condition. These results reveal a specific pattern of “in-the-moment” affective dysfunction unique to pleasant situations that is consistent across both subjective experience and lexical expression.     

La construction mimétique du soi-agent et les phénomènes de schizophrénie débutante

A new interpretation of the onset of schizophrenia is presented based on a mimetic and attributional model of the self as agent. Two separate independent perspectives on schizophrenia will be analyzed and criticized in relation to this model. The first one from the works of Henri Grivois, inspired by the general anthropology of René Girard is therefore oriented toward the mimetic dimension of interactions. The critique will focus on the gratuitous reduction of imitation to the domain of bodily motor functions when a much wider understanding of the concept is needed. The second perspective, proposed by Richard Bentall et al., deals with the attributional style of paranoids and is therefore mainly cognitive. The critique will focus on the reductionist and solipsistic vision of a self unduly equated with self-esteem. I intend to show that their respective mimetic and attributional foci are both needed in order to have a better understanding of the delusional subject, for these two dimensions define the inter-subjective space in which the self is built. As a matter of fact, the self is traditionally described as having two fundamental components, the me or object self and the I or agent self. But only the first one, the me, has been thoroughly investigated by the so-called “social mirror” research tradition which originates in Cooley’s “looking glass self” hypothesis. The “I” has constantly eluded scientific investigation and has therefore been virtually ignored by psychologists in the twentieth century. Many researchers have even proposed abandoning it to the realm of philosophy. However, as soon as the social mirror metaphor is understood as the imitation of others’ attributions to the object self, we may conceive of the agent self as the product of these imitations of attributions along the causal dimension. The “I”, characterized by the feeling of being the first cause of one’s own behavior, would therefore be of no less social origin than the “me”. Attributions of intention, responsibility or causality made by others to the self, when mimetically interiorized, will feed the causal self, the “I”. This unitary and psychological conception of self allows a new interpretation of some characteristic aspects of the onset of schizophrenia. The typical feeling of being a focus of attention of an entourage sometimes extended to the whole world can now appear as just the pathological version of the healthy “centrality” of the self in the « social mirror ». The question is: how does the bifurcation of the dynamics of self towards pathology happen? I hypothesize that if the causal attributions that normally “feed” the self along the agency dimension are too scarce, this will lead the self schema to an “abreaction” which consists of “hallucinating” personal causal attributions in the minute attentions, attitudes and messages provided by anonymous public social interactions. All these signs, when perceived and delusionally interpreted, will help the subject maintain the vital feeling of being a “cause” capable of “effects” which characterizes animated beings as opposed to pawns. Hence, the fact that paranoids are prone to perceive others as having malevolent intentions towards them, far from being explained by Bentall’s hypothesis - since a bad social self image doesn’t improve self-esteem - can be interpreted as their longing for causal attributions. In other words, accusations, malevolent attention and intentions are good for the feeling of agency. This conception might shed some new light on the specific susceptibility of adolescents regarding schizophrenia.     

Longing for existential recognition: A qualitative study of everyday concerns for people with somatoform disorders

Objective

Patients with somatoform disorders could be vulnerable to stressors and have difficulties coping with stress. The aim was to explore what the patients experience as stressful and how they resolve stress in everyday life.

Methods

A cross-sectional retrospective design using 24 semi-structured individual life history interviews. Data-analysis was based on grounded theory.

Results

A major concern in patients was a longing for existential recognition. This influenced the patients' self-confidence, stress appraisals, symptom perceptions, and coping attitudes. Generally, patients had difficulties with self-confidence and self-recognition of bodily sensations, feelings, vulnerability, and needs, which negatively framed their attempts to obtain recognition in social interactions. Experiences of recognition appeared in three different modalities: 1) “existential misrecognition” covered the experience of being met with distrust and disrespect, 2) “uncertain existential recognition” covered experiences of unclear communication and a perception of not being totally recognized, and 3) “successful existential recognition” covered experiences of total respect and understanding. “Misrecognition” and “uncertain recognition” related to decreased self-confidence, avoidant coping behaviours, increased stress, and symptom appraisal; whereas “successful recognition” related to higher self-confidence, active coping behaviours, decreased stress, and symptom appraisal.

Conclusion

Different modalities of existential recognition influenced self-identity and social identity affecting patients' daily stress and symptom appraisals, self-confidence, self-recognition, and coping attitudes. Clinically it seems crucial to improve the patients' ability to communicate concerns, feelings, and needs in social interactions. Better communicative skills and more active coping could reduce the harm the patients experienced by not being recognized and increase the healing potential of successful recognition.     

Dimensions of adolescent subjective social status within the school community: Description and correlates

School pupils strive to meet both school-defined and social goals, and the structure of adolescent self-concept is multidimensional, including both academic and non-academic self-perceptions. However, subjective social status within the school community has been represented as a single dimension. Scottish 15-year olds participating in a school-based survey (N = 3194) rated their own status, compared to their school year-group, via images of seven 10-rung ladders. These generated a very high response rate, and factor analysis distinguished three dimensions: (1) ladders representing “popular”, “powerful”, “respected”, “attractive or stylish” and “trouble-maker”; (2) “doing well at school” and “[not] a trouble-maker”; and (3) “sporty”. Unique relationships with variables representing more objective and/or self-report behavioural measures suggest these dimensions are markers of “peer”, “scholastic” and “sports” status. These analyses suggest multiple dimensions of adolescent social hierarchy can be very simply measured and contribute towards the development of more robust instruments within this area.     

Testing the validity of implicit measures of wanting and liking

Background and objectives

Over the last decade, there has been a surge of studies examining implicit processes underlying addiction. Some implicit measures are assumed to reflect “liking” whereas other implicit measures are assumed to reflect “wanting”. There is, however, little evidence to back up this claim. We examined whether implicit and explicit measures of wanting and of liking are differentially sensitive to manipulations of wanting and expected that these manipulations would affect primarily measures of wanting.

Methods

Smokers and non-smokers performed both implicit and explicit measures that are assumed to assess wanting and liking for smoking. Smokers were tested once immediately after smoking, and once after 12 h of nicotine-deprivation.

Results

IAT results suggested that smokers showed more implicit liking for nicotine when they were deprived than when they were satiated, whereas there were no differences in wanting. Smokers also seemed to show both more implicit wanting and more implicit liking for nicotine compared to non-smokers. Explicit measures did yield the expected results in that smokers reported to want nicotine more when they were deprived, whereas there were smaller differences in liking.

Conclusions

We found little support for the assumption that implicit measures of wanting and liking capture different processes. Researchers should thus be cautious in drawing conclusions about wanting and liking on the basis of these measures.     

The attitudes of Belgian adolescents towards peers with disabilities

This study aimed to explore Belgian adolescents’ attitudes towards peers with disabilities and to explore factors associated with these attitudes. Based on the theory of persuasive communication, this study focused on receiver variables (the “whom”), characteristics of students with disabilities (“concerning who”) and channel (“how”). An online survey was created and published on several popular websites for youngsters. Attitudes were assessed by means of the CATCH questionnaire among 167 adolescents between 11 and 20 years old. Univariate and multivariate regression analyses were conducted. Belgian adolescents had fairly tolerant attitudes towards peers with disabilities. Factors associated with more positive attitudes were being female, and viewing a video introduction of a peer with a disability before assessing attitudes. Factors such as having a parent, sibling or good friend with a disability and frequent contact with persons with disabilities did not remain significant in the overall model. The way in which students with disabilities are presented to their peers is very important. Further research is needed among larger samples, including more diverse variables, concerning the former mentioned categories, and also concerning the source (the “who”) and message (the “what”).     

Big five-factor contributions to addiction to alcohol

Introduction

Personality in the field of addiction has been the subject of many studies. The purpose of this article is to synthesize the data obtained with the Neuroticism Extraversion Openness – Personality Inventory – Revised (NEO-PI-R) and the NEO – Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI) among the persons who drink and suffer from addiction to alcohol.

Background

These tools, based on the theory of “The Big Five Factors”, assess the personality from a dimensional point of view. The five big dimensions addressed by these tools, are “Neuroticism” (general tendency to experience negative feelings), “Extraversion” (sociability, positive feelings, activity and self-confidence), “Openness” (imagination, intellectual curiosity, aesthetic sensitivity, attention paid to one's own feelings and no dogmatic behavior), “Agreeableness” (interpersonal tendencies) and “Conscientiousness” (forward planning, organization and task carrying out). According to Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of mental disorders (DSM-IV-TR), alcohol consumption is based on three dissimilar behaviors: utilization (alcohol consumption not leading to complications or damage), abuse (regular consumption likely to cause somatic, psycho-emotional or social damage for the individual or for his/her family circle) and dependency (excessive utilization leading to deterioration in functioning or clinically significant suffering).

Literature findings

Alcohol consumption among young adults can thus be predicted through a high level of “Neuroticism” associated with a low level of “Agreeableness”. Persons having been addicted to alcohol (present or past) have a high level of “Neuroticism”, a low “Agreeableness” and a low level of “Conscientiousness”, contrary to patients who have never been addicted to alcohol. The NEO-PI-R also enables a more accurate analysis of the personality, since each of these five big dimensions is divided into six facets. Among the patients with a past or present diagnosis of alcohol abuse, we found a low score on facets “trust”, “achievement striving”, “self-discipline” and “dutifulness” and a high score on “impulsiveness”, “vulnerability”, and “excitement-seeking”. Although dimension and facet results measured by this tool can differ according to craving level or according to gender, the studies agree in that there are common aspects among the patients.     

« Une danseuse est dressée (sur la pointe des pieds) ». Approche de la question du masochisme dans la danse classique

Practising ballet at a professional level implies an almost permanent physical pain. We suppose that such a pain, to be borne, requires to be found pleasant, to be satisfactory in some way. As a result, we assume that ballet dancers present masochistic features. These masochistic features could belong to two different types of masochism: either a “narcissistic” or an “object” masochism, or, using the words of Michel Fain, either a “completed” or an “uncompleted”. By referring to the notions of Ego-skin (Didier Anzieu), suffering covering membrane (Micheline Enriquez), self-calming processes (Gérard Szwec) and self-sadism (Jean Gillibert), we first demonstrate that in the narcissistic/uncompleted type of masochism, pain would be wanted because of its holding function: hurting the body would paradoxically enable the subject to define its outlines by experiencing them. In a second time, referring to the works of S. Freud, we demonstrate that in the objectal/completed type, pain would be wanted because of the fact the subject has an unconscious need for punishment from a parental authority; pain would enable the subject to satisfy his incestuous desires in a regressive way and at the same time to expiate the crime that this satisfaction constitutes.     

Emotionally arousing stimuli compete for attention with left hemispace

Rapid interaction of the emotional and attentional networks is critical for adaptive behavior. Here, we examined the effects of emotional stimulation on hemifield attention allocation using event-related potential and behavioral measures. Participants performed a visual-discrimination task on nonemotional targets presented randomly in the left or right hemifield. A brief task-irrelevant emotional (pleasant or unpleasant; 150-ms duration) or neutral picture was presented centrally 350 ms before the next target (150-ms duration). Unpleasant stimuli interfered with the left visual field attention capacity, slowing behavioral responses to attended left field stimuli. In keeping with the behavioral data, event-related potential responses to nonemotional attended left field stimuli were reduced over the right parietal regions when preceded by an unpleasant event. The results provide electrophysiological and behavioral evidence that unpleasant, emotionally arousing stimuli interfere with the right hemisphere-dependent attention capacity.     

Modulation of visual event-related potentials by emotional olfactory stimuli

The objective of the present study was to determine whether an olfactory prime could modulate behavior and visual event-related potentials (ERPs) obtained in response to a visual stimulation representing female faces. More specifically, we tested the hypothesis that a pleasant odor could have effects on face perception: behavioral effects on subjective emotional estimation of faces, and on associated response times, and electrophysiological effects on the N400 and late positive complex or LPC. Experiments were performed in which subjects had to decide whether the presented face was pleasant or not, while visual ERPs were recorded. Faces were always primed with either a pleasant odor or a neutral olfactory stimulus (pure air). In order to test the effect of subject's awareness, participants were not informed that an odor would be presented in the experimental sessions. Responses were significantly shorter for unpleasant faces. However, no behavioral effects of the pleasant odor on response time or on evaluation of face pleasantness were observed. Late ERPs evoked by faces were modulated by the presence of a pleasant odor, even when subjects were neither warned nor aware of the presence of the odor: in a frontal site and after the diffusion of the odor, the LPC (appearing 550 ms after the presentation of the visual stimulus) evoked by unpleasant faces was significantly more positive than the LPC evoked by pleasant faces. This effect could reflect an enhanced alert reaction to unpleasant faces are preceded by an (incongrous) pleasant odor.     

Changes in emotional empathy, affective responsivity, and behavior following severe traumatic brain injury

This study was designed to examine the relationship between deficits in empathy, emotional responsivity, and social behavior in adults with severe traumatic brain injury (TBI). A total of 21 patients with severe TBI and 25 control participants viewed six film clips containing pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral content whilst facial muscle responses, skin conductance, and valence and arousal ratings were measured. Emotional empathy (the Balanced Emotional Empathy Scale, BEES: self-report) and changes in drive and control in social situations (The Current Behaviour Scale, CBS: relative report) were also assessed. In comparison to control participants, those in the TBI group reported less ability to empathize emotionally and had reduced facial responding to both pleasant and unpleasant films. They also exhibited lowered autonomic arousal, as well as abnormal ratings of valence and arousal, particularly to unpleasant films. Relative reported loss of emotional control was significantly associated with heightened empathy, while there was a trend to suggest that impaired drive (or motivation) may be related to lower levels of emotional empathy. The results represent the first to suggest that level of emotional empathy post traumatic brain injury may be associated with behavioral manifestations of disorders of drive and control.     

Motivated attention to cocaine and emotional cues in abstinent and current cocaine users--an ERP study

Event-related potentials (ERPs) are a direct measure of neural activity and are ideally suited to study the time-course of attentional engagement with emotional and drug-related stimuli in addiction. In particular, the late positive potential (LPP) appears to be enhanced following cocaine-related compared with neutral stimuli in human participants with cocaine use disorders (CUD). However, previous studies have not directly compared cocaine-related with emotional stimuli while examining potential differences between abstinent and current cocaine users. The present study examined ERPs in 55 CUD (27 abstinent and 28 current users) and 29 matched healthy controls while they passively viewed pleasant, unpleasant, neutral and cocaine-related pictures. To examine the time-course of attention to these stimuli, we analysed both an early and later window in the LPP as well as the early posterior negativity (EPN), established in assessing motivated attention. Cocaine pictures elicited increased electrocortical measures of motivated attention in ways similar to affectively pleasant and unpleasant pictures in all CUD, an effect that was no longer discernible during the late LPP window for the current users. This group also exhibited deficient processing of the other emotional stimuli (early LPP window - pleasant pictures; late LPP window - pleasant and unpleasant pictures). Results were unique to the LPP and not EPN. Taken together, results support a relatively early attention bias to cocaine stimuli in cocaine-addicted individuals, further suggesting that recent cocaine use decreases such attention bias during later stages of processing but at the expense of deficient processing of other emotional stimuli.     

Tryptophan-hydroxylase 2 haplotype association with borderline personality disorder and aggression in a sample of patients with personality disorders and healthy controls

Background

There is a decreased serotonergic function in impulsive aggression and borderline personality disorder (BPD), and genetic association studies suggest a role of serotonergic genes in impulsive aggression and BPD. Only one study has analyzed the association between the tryptophan-hydroxylase 2 (TPH2) gene and BPD. A TPH2 “risk” haplotype has been described that is associated with anxiety, depression and suicidal behavior.

Methods

We assessed the relationship between the previously identified “risk” haplotype at the TPH2 locus and BPD diagnosis, impulsive aggression, affective lability, and suicidal/parasuicidal behaviors, in a well-characterized clinical sample of 103 healthy controls (HCs) and 251 patients with personality disorders (109 with BPD). A logistic regression including measures of depression, affective lability and aggression scores in predicting “risk” haplotype was conducted.

Results

The prevalence of the “risk” haplotype was significantly higher in patients with BPD compared to HCs. Those with the “risk” haplotype have higher aggression and affect lability scores and more suicidal/parasuicidal behaviors than those without it. In the logistic regression model, affect lability was the only significant predictor and it correctly classified 83.1% of the subjects as “risk” or “non-risk” haplotype carriers.

Conclusions

We found an association between the previously described TPH2 “risk” haplotype and BPD diagnosis, affective lability, suicidal/parasuicidal behavior, and aggression scores.     

Impaired vitality form recognition in autism

Along with the understanding of the goal of an action (“what” is done) and the intention underlying it (“why” it is done), social interactions largely depend on the appraisal of the action from the dynamics of the movement: “how” it is performed (its “vitality form”). Do individuals with autism, especially children, possess this capacity? Here we show that, unlike typically developing individuals, individuals with autism reveal severe deficits in recognizing vitality forms, and their capacity to appraise them does not improve with age. Deficit in vitality form recognition appears, therefore, to be a newly recognized trait marker of autism.     

Étude de l’influence des troubles mentaux sur les difficultés de réinsertion sociale

The psychiatric problems of the “homeless” population are now recognized. The aim of this article is to focus the study on a sample of this population (n = 999) asking for help in their social insertion. The results on clinical disorders (Axis I of the DSM-IV) and personality disorders (Axis II of the DSM-IV) are compared to estimations on general population and to other studies on “homeless” in France. These comparisons show the prevalences of some disorders whose symptoms involve problems in social rehabilitation. At last, measures of interaction and impact (multiplicative interactions, odd ratio, etiologic fractions) shows that these morbid associations increase the problems in the attempts to social rehabilitation.     

When does less yield more? The impact of severity upon implicit recognition in pure alexia

Pure alexia (PA) is characterised by strong effects of word length on reading times and is sometimes accompanied by an overt letter-by-letter (LBL) reading strategy. Past studies have reported “implicit recognition” in some individual PA patients. This is a striking finding because such patients are able to perform semantic classification and lexical decision at above chance levels even when the exposure duration is short enough to prevent explicit identification. In an attempt to determine the prevalence of this “implicit recognition” effect, we assessed semantic categorisation and lexical decision performance using limited exposure durations in 10 PA cases. The majority of the patients showed above chance accuracy in semantic categorisation and lexical decision. Performance on the lexical decision test was influenced by frequency and imageability. In addition, we found that the extent to which patients showed evidence of “implicit recognition” in both tasks was inversely related to the severity of their reading disorder. This result is consistent with hypotheses which suggest that this effect does not constitute an implicit form of unique word identification but is a reflection of the degree of partial activation within the word recognition system. These results also go some way towards explaining the individual variation in the presence of this effect observed across previous case-study investigations in the literature.