(079) Perception of Signals of Sexual Interest in Patients with Schizophrenia

Abstract

Abstract Introduction Patients with schizophrenia (SCH) face many difficulties in forming and maintaining sexual relationships and often have unmet needs around intimacy. Low satisfaction with sexual relationships has been linked to a decrease in overall quality of life. Single relationship status also correlates with a poorer prognosis. However, the exploration of sources of sexual and relationship deficits in patients is an area that is habitually neglected, and there is little research addressing this phenomenon. Objective Our study aims to identify whether difficulties in forming sexual relationships reported by patients with SCH could be connected to: a) a compromised ability to interpret, recognize and respond to signals of sexual interest b) decreased salience of sexual intimacy. Methods Sample: Twenty male and female patients with schizophrenia and a control group of the same size, matched for demographic parameters, will be recruited from the Study of first episodes of schizophrenia (ESO). ESO is a large prospective database dedicated to the longitudinal follow-up of first-episode patients with SCH which contains a wealth of information on bio-psycho-social markers. Procedure: The variables of interest will be tested by two experiments developed in our laboratory. The first experiment depicts male and female actors showing behavioral displays conveying signals of a) sexual interest, b) neutral but friendly attitude and c) rejection, towards the observer. The second experiment is a simple viewing task designed to assess the salience of erotic stimuli compared to neutral ones. In addition, eye movements and pupil dilation will be measured using the eye-tracking device Eyelink 1000plus. Statistical analysis: A repeated-measures t-test will be used to assess the change in a continuous outcome. Results Preliminary results show that the patients (N=10) spent more time on erotic images (mean time= 884.69 ms) than the control group (N=9) (mean time= 772.14 ms). This difference is not statistically significant (p = 0.21). Currently, more data are being collected. Conclusions The preliminary results demonstrate that there is no difference in the interest in explicit sexual stimuli between patients with SCH and healthy controls. Explicit erotic signals seem to be sexually salient to them, which indicates their interest in sexual intimacy. Our research will further determine whether individuals with SCH have impaired ability to perceive, interpret, and react to signals of sexual interest. The implications of our findings could lead to a formulation of sexual remediation strategies. The study was supported by the Czech Health Research Council, no. NU21J-04-00024 and the Charles University, Fac Med1, GAUK no. 56123. Disclosure No.