Word association and measures of psychosis proneness in university students

Abstract

Two tests of word association, the Kent-Rosanoff Word Association Test (WAT) and the Word Halo Test (WHT), were administered to 93 university students. These subjects had also completed four psychometric measures hypothesized to identify psychosis prone individual—the Lovibond Object Sorting Test scored for allusive thinking (OST), Eysenck's Psychoticism scale (EPQP) and the Chapman scales for Physical Anhedonia (ANH) and Perceptual Aberration (PAS). There was no evidence of substantial interrelationship between the measures of psychosis proneness. In male subjects significant correlations were found between proportion of distant responses on the WAT and OST and EPQP scores. High PAS score in males were associated withe selecting more uncommon words as being nearly the same in meaning of the WHT. These findings provide evidence for the multidimensional nature of psychosis proneness, and suggest that altered cognitive processing is associated with at least some forms of psychiatric vulnerability.