title: Altered depth perception is associated with presence of schizotypal personality traits.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Impaired depth perception, a fundamental aspect of early visual processing, has been shown in patients with schizophrenia suggesting a disturbance to magnocellular and possibly parvocellular pathways. Despite some evidence showing visual-perceptive deficits in people with schizotypal personality traits (SPT), depth perception has not been evaluated in these subjects.
  
  
  METHODS
  12 clinically healthy schizotypy and 17 control participants were examined using a novel stereoscopic depth perception task. A mixed ANOVA design considered the Group (SPT/control) as independent factor, and trial Block (BD/BD+/BD-) and target Condition (SDSS/SDDS/DDSS/DDDS) were considered as repeated measures.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Schizotypal participants were not significantly different to controls on simple judgements of depth but demonstrated a subtle impairment in perceiving binocular depth when performing high difficulty judgements.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The presence of subtle depth perception problems in schizotypal subjects, similar but less marked than those of schizophrenia patients, may suggest a less pervasive disturbance of early information processing. If so, such deficits could be considered as innate neurological changes that may occur in people vulnerable for schizophrenia, thus with the potential to be a novel intermediate phenotype.
authors: Department of Psychology, Sapienza-University of Rome, Rome, Italy. barbatomariapaola@gmail.com
authors: Mariapaola
authors: M
authors: Barbato
authors: Simon Lowes
authors: SL
authors: Collinson
authors: Maria
authors: M
authors: Casagrande
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D003867:Depth Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D012565:Schizophrenic Psychology; D012569:Schizotypal Personality Disorder / Q000523:psychology*; D055815:Young Adult