title: Cerebral signs of altered adaptability in females with acute psychosis.
abstract: In psychosis, behavior is not guided by sensory cues from surroundings. Novel, meaningful behaviors require intact integrative functions such as short-term memory and motor planning, as well as an optimized level of arousal. In this study, we monitored markers of automatic auditory processing in 15 female never-medicated psychotic patients. Fifty-eight channels of EEG were recorded simultaneously with sympathetic skin responses while arousing auditory stimuli were delivered. Neuropsychological tests concentrating on frontal lobe functions were also performed. Prominent neurophysiological and behavioral signs of increased cortical activation were observed in psychotic patients. This widespread disinhibition may attempt to compensate for the impairment of neuronal processing of sensory input from surroundings in the earliest stages of a psychotic illness.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Kuopio University Hospital, P.O. Box 1777, Finland.
authors.forename: Minna
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Valkonen-Korhonen
authors.forename: Mervi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Könönen
authors.forename: Heidi
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Yppärilä
authors.forename: Perttu
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Sipilä
authors.forename: Johannes
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lehtonen
authors.forename: Juhani
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Partanen
authors.forename: Ina M
authors.initials: IM
authors.lastname: Tarkka
authors.forename: Jari
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Karhu
mesh_terms: D000208:Acute Disease; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001143:Arousal / Q000502:physiology; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000503:physiopathology*; D005072:Evoked Potentials, Auditory; D005260:Female; D006185:Habituation, Psychophysiologic; D006801:Humans; D016014:Linear Models; D008875:Middle Aged; D011618:Psychotic Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology*; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000503:physiopathology; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric