title: The relationship between visual object exploration and action processing in schizophrenia.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Abnormalities in visual exploration and action processing are widely reported in schizophrenia. The aim of this study was to investigate whether object exploration (in order to recognise an action or the object) modulates visuomotor behaviour differently in schizophrenic patients and controls.
  
  
  METHODS
  Visual scan paths were monitored in 36 patients and 36 controls. Participants performed three tasks, in which they were asked to either (1) name the object (the object-naming task), (2) picture themselves interacting with the object and then name the action (the action-naming task), or (3) explore the object (the free-viewing task).
  
  
  RESULTS
  Patients explored objects less than controls did. Controls explored the part needed to identify an object in the object-naming task and the whole object in the action-naming and free-viewing tasks. In contrast, the patients maintained their gaze on the "identity" part of the object in all three tasks.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our results were consistent with the literature findings on impaired action processing in schizophrenia but also extend the known impairment to implicit action processing when the subject is visually exploring an object. We discuss our results in terms of motivation, the effect of dopamine on eye movement, attentional capture, and frontal lobe dysfunction.
authors.affiliation: Laboratoire de Neurosciences Fonctionnelles et Pathologies, Université Lille-Nord de France, CNRS, Lille, France.
authors.forename: Céline
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Delerue
authors.forename: Muriel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Boucart
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005106:Exploratory Behavior; D053483:Eye Movement Measurements; D005260:Female; D005403:Fixation, Ocular; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010468:Perceptual Disorders; D012438:Saccades; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000503:physiopathology*; D014796:Visual Perception