Early onset schizophrenia: cognitive and clinical characteristics

Abstract

Abstract Schizophrenia commonly begins in young adulthood (Hafner et al. 1993). However, about 4 per cent of cases experience an unusually early onset of the disorder before 18 years of age (Cannon et al. 1999). Some of the studies reviewed here focused on patients with onset before the age of 12 (childhoodonset schizophrenia), others have examined adolescents (adolescent-onset schizophrenia) and some have included a mixture of children and adolescents. The boundary between childhood and adolescent onset schizophrenia reflects traditional divisions in the structure of psychiatric services rather than differences in presumed aetiology or pathophysiology.