Increased psychophysiological parameters of attention in non-psychotic individuals with auditory verbal hallucinations.
OBJECTIVE
Schizophrenia is associated with aberrant event-related potentials (ERPs) such as reductions in P300, processing negativity and mismatch negativity amplitudes. These deficits may be related to the propensity of schizophrenia patients to experience auditory verbal hallucinations (AVH). However, AVH are part of extensive and variable symptomatology in schizophrenia. For this reason non-psychotic individuals with AVH as an isolated symptom provide an excellent opportunity to investigate this relationship.


METHODS
P300 waveforms, processing negativity and mismatch negativity were examined with an auditory oddball paradigm in 18 non-psychotic individuals with AVH and 18 controls.


RESULTS
P300 amplitude was increased in the AVH group as compared to controls, reflecting superior effortful attention. A trend in the same direction was found for processing negativity. No significant differences were found for mismatch negativity.


CONCLUSIONS
Contrary to our expectations, non-psychotic individuals with AVH show increased rather than decreased psychophysiological measures of effortful attention compared to healthy controls, refuting a pivotal role of decreased effortful attention in the pathophysiology of AVH.
van Lutterveld
Remko
R
Neuroscience Division, University Medical Center Utrecht and Rudolf Magnus Institute for Neuroscience, Utrecht, The Netherlands. R.vanlutterveld@umcutrecht.nl
Oranje
Bob
B
Kemner
Chantal
C
Abramovic
Lucija
L
Willems
Anne E
AE
Boks
Marco P M
MP
Glenthøj
Birte Y
BY
Kahn
René S
RS
Sommer
Iris E C
IE
D000161:Acoustic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D003265:Contingent Negative Variation / Q000502:physiology; D004562:Electrocardiography / Q000379:methods; D004569:Electroencephalography / Q000379:methods; D018913:Event-Related Potentials, P300 / Q000502:physiology*; D006212:Hallucinations / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006801:Humans; D011601:Psychophysics; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology