Risk factors in the development of schizophrenia: contributions from a study of children of schizophrenic mothers.
The development of and the results from a prospective longitudinal study of children of schizophrenic mothers are presented. The presented studies have been guided by a diathesis-stress model of psychopathology and data analyses relied on the paradigm that schizophrenics and schizotypes share genetic liability to schizophrenia, but that the former, in addition, suffer from environmental insult. This paradigm, hypothetically formulated by Paul Meehl (21) proved especially fruitful in the etiological inferences made in this study. The results indicate that schizophrenia is, to some degree, genetically transmitted and that schizotypes share this genetic vulnerability with schizophrenics. Schizophrenia may be conceptualized as an environmentally complicated schizotypal personality disorder. Deleterious environmental influences identified in this study are obstetric complications probably resulting in central brain atrophy as measured by the CT-scans. In addition, future schizophrenics experienced disrupted childhood conditions as measured here by the amount of institutional rearing during the first five years of life. Fathers of the high risk children were more frequently mentally disturbed than fathers of the low risk children. The presence of a schizophrenia spectrum disorder in the father significantly increased a risk for such disorder in the high risk offspring. Continuity of psychopathological deviance in the form of subtle formal thought disorder and defective emotional contact was demonstrated for the schizophrenics and schizotypes from childhood into adulthood. This suggests that such symptoms are central to schizophrenic psychopathology and that schizophrenia is a development and not a disease which affects people without forewarning.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
D000293:Adolescent; D001921:Brain / Q000473:pathology; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D007744:Obstetric Labor Complications; D010290:Parents / Q000523:psychology; D011247:Pregnancy; D011248:Pregnancy Complications; D011446:Prospective Studies; D011599:Psychopathology; D011610:Psychosocial Deprivation; D012107:Research Design; D012306:Risk; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000209:etiology* / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology