Abstract
Enhanced spreading of semantic activation has been hypothesized to underlie some of the most significant symptoms of schizotypal personality, like thought disorder, odd speech, delusion, or magical thinking. We applied the Deese/Roediger-McDermott false memory task to the study of semantic activation in a group of 123 non-clinical individuals varying in the three dimensions of schizotypal personality: positive, negative and disorganized schizotypy. In the study phase, we presented them with lists composed of words semantically associated to unpresented critical words. Then, they responded to a recognition questionnaire including previously presented words and critical unpresented lures, as well as weakly related and unrelated unpresented lures. Participants rated their confidence in recognizing each word. They also filled in a standardized schizotypal personality questionnaire. Confirming the false memory effect, recognition ratings provided in response to critical words were higher than those produced for both weakly related and unrelated items. Crucially, scores in the positive dimension increased recognition percentages and confidence ratings for weakly related and unrelated lures. This study indicates that high levels of positive schizotypy might influence the tendency to accept false memories of unrelated unpresented material.
Highlights
Schizotypal personality has been considered to be an indicator of vulnerability to psychosis (Meehl, 1962), based on markers such as eccentric behavior, strange speech, unusual beliefs, uncommon perceptive experiences or social isolation
This hypothesis relies on a conception of semantic memory as a network of interconnected nodes in which, when a given node is activated, semantic activation spreads to associated nodes, with stronger associates receiving higher activation levels than weaker ones (Collins and Loftus, 1975)
No significant associations appeared between scores in the schizotypal personality questionnaire and recognition percentages corresponding to critical lures or target words
Summary
Schizotypal personality has been considered to be an indicator of vulnerability to psychosis (Meehl, 1962), based on markers such as eccentric behavior, strange speech, unusual beliefs, uncommon perceptive experiences or social isolation. This proposal is based on previous findings associating schizotypy with semantic effects such as more original responses in semantic fluency tasks (Kiang and Kutas, 2005; Rodríguez-Ferreiro and Aguilera, 2019) or increased semantic priming (Moritz et al, 1999; Johnston et al, 2008), among others This hypothesis relies on a conception of semantic memory as a network of interconnected nodes in which, when a given node is activated, semantic activation spreads to associated nodes, with stronger associates receiving higher activation levels than weaker ones (Collins and Loftus, 1975). From this point of view, increased semantic activation spreading in schizotypal individuals, leading to over-activation of loosely associated concepts, could explain the appearance of atypical speech patterns with associative intrusions, as well as ideas of reference or magical ideation connecting unrelated events in high schizotypes (Mohr et al, 2001; Pizzagalli et al, 2001)
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