The patient with schizophrenia and his father. The father's role and personality traits in the dynamics of the family with a son suffering from schizophrenia

The role of the father in the onset and development of schizophrenic disorder/disturbance is very often secondary as compared to that of the mother. This study deals with the father's sphere in the family with a patient/son suffering from schizophrenia, the traits of his personality and his relationship with his son/patient, and with his wife/the mother of the patient. The methods applied were clinical interview, structured interview and semantic differential. The following statistical procedures were used: correlation, componential, discriminative, factor and quasicanonical analyses. The results include some characteristic excerpts from clinical interviews with patients/sons and their fathers, projective perception of current family relationships, quasicanonical analysis of the father's, mother's and son's experiences of the patient's/son's early childhood, and the projective view of the father. Among the conclusions reached, the phenomenon of "dead father" is emphasized as one of the main factors in the onset and development of schizophrenic disorder/disturbance.