An analysis of complex sentence structures in patients with schizophrenia

Abstract

Patients with schizophrenia often display unusual language impairments and these abnormalities in language are among the most extreme and obvious symptoms in Schizophrenia Disorder. In this context, this research attempts to analyze andcompare the schizophrenic patients’ and control group’s speech in terms of complex sentence structures. Fifty patientswith schizophrenia diagnosed according to DSM-IV criteria have been includedd in the study and compared to fifty healthysubjects matched for age, sex and education level with the patients. The subjects’ speech has been evaluated in fourstages. These are narration, story picture sequencing, semi-structured speech and free speech. The data consists of 8-10minute recorded interviews. The recordings have been transcribed based on DuBois’ Discourse Transcription Symbols. Thestatistical and linguistic analyses have shown significant differences between complex sentence types’ of patients withschizophrenia and healthy subjects’. The findings have demonstrated that due to the possible cognitive problems thespeech produced by schizophrenia patients is syntactically less complex than that of controls. Additionally, patients withschizophrenia use shorter and simple sentences instead of complex sentences compared to healthy subjects. Keywords: schizophrenia, sentence structure, complex sentence, language disorder, thought disorder.