Attentional performance in positive- and negative-symptom schizophrenia.
Two tasks designed to measure selective attention were administered to schizophrenics, patients with bipolar disorder, and normal subjects. Schizophrenics were divided into three subgroups: positive-, negative-, and mixed-symptom patients. Positive-symptom schizophrenics showed significant deficits on a digit-span task when compared to normal subjects. Furthermore, the positive group was the only one to show a significant performance decrement in the distraction condition of the digit-span task. There were no significant group differences in performance on a dichotic listening test. The results of the present study are contrary to the hypothesis that selective attention deficits are characteristic of negative-symptom schizophrenia. Instead, the findings suggest that positive symptoms are associated with greater susceptibility to distraction.
D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D001288:Attention; D004007:Dichotic Listening Tests; D005260:Female; D006760:Hospitalization; D006801:Humans; D007361:Intelligence Tests; D008297:Male; D008570:Memory, Short-Term; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000145:classification / Q000175:diagnosis*; D012565:Schizophrenic Psychology