Memory In Psychosis Research Articles

“The urge to tell and its consequences”: women’s memoirs of schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder

Purpose This paper aims to explore the efforts of four American women living with psychosis to chart their recovery process in published memoirs. Design/methodology/approach This paper looks at the different types of stigma that the patient-authors claim to encounter. Findings The author discusses the impact that the patient-authors see stigma as having on their recovery, and why they need artistic spaces to express themselves. Originality/value The memoirs offer a space for the women to revisit their memories of psychosis, and to achieve at least a partial acceptance of these experiences.

Effects of Anticholinergic Burden on Verbal Memory Performance in First-Episode Psychosis.

Antipsychotics are widely used to treat first-episode psychosis but may have an anticholinergic burden, that is, a cumulative effect of medications that block the cholinergic system. Studies suggest that a high anticholinergic burden negatively affects memory in psychosis, where cognitive deficits, particularly those in verbal memory, are a core feature of the disease. The present study sought to replicate this in a large cohort of well-characterized first-episode psychosis patients. We expected that patients in the highest anticholinergic burden group would exhibit the poorest verbal memory compared to those with low anticholinergic burden and healthy controls at baseline (3 months following admission). We further hypothesized that over time, at month 12, patients' verbal memory performance would improve but would remain inferior to controls. Patients (n = 311; low anticholinergic burden [n = 241] and high anticholinergic burden [n = 70], defined by a Drug Burden Index cut-off of 1) and healthy controls (n = 128) completed a clinical and neurocognitive battery including parts of the Wechsler Memory Scale at months 3 and 12. Cross-sectionally, using an analysis of variance, patients in the highest anticholinergic burden group had the poorest performance in verbal memory when compared to the other groups at month 3, F(2,430) = 52.33, P < 0.001. Longitudinally, using a Generalized Estimating Equation model, the verbal memory performance of all groups improved over time. However, patients' performance overall remained poorer than the controls. These findings highlight the importance of considering the anticholinergic burden when prescribing medications in the early stages of the disease.

Impaired relational memory in the early stage of psychosis

BackgroundHumans constantly take in vast amounts of information, which must be filtered, flexibly manipulated, and integrated into cohesive relational memories in order to choose relevant behaviors. Relational memory is impaired in chronic schizophrenia, which has been linked to hippocampal dysfunction. It is unclear whether relational memory is impaired in the early stage of psychosis. MethodsWe studied eye movements during a face-scene pairs task as an indirect measure of relational memory in 89 patients in the early stage of psychosis and 84 healthy control participants. During testing, scenes were overlaid with three equally-familiar faces and participants were asked to recall the matching (i.e. previously-paired) face. During Match trials, one face had been previously paired with the scene. During Non-Match trials, no faces matched the scene. Forced-choice explicit recognition was recorded as a direct measure of relational memory. ResultsHealthy control subjects rapidly (within 250–500 ms) showed preferential viewing of the matching face during Match trials. In contrast, preferential viewing was delayed in patients in the early stage of psychosis. Explicit recognition of the matching face was also impaired in the patient group. ConclusionsThis study provides novel evidence for a relational memory deficit in the early stage of psychosis. Patients showed deficits in both explicit recognition as well as abnormal eye-movement patterns during memory recall. Eye movements provide a promising avenue for the study of relational memory in psychosis, as they allow for the assessment of rapid, nonverbal memory processes.

Predictive Pursuit Association with Deficits in Working Memory in Psychosis

Deficits in smooth pursuit eye movements are an established phenotype for schizophrenia (SZ) and are being investigated as a potential liability marker for bipolar disorder. Although the molecular determinants of this deficit are still unclear, research has verified deficits in predictive pursuit mechanisms in SZ. Because predictive pursuit might depend on the working memory system, we have hypothesized a relationship between the two in healthy control subjects (HC) and SZ and here examine whether it extends to psychotic bipolar disorder (BDP). Volunteers with SZ (n = 38), BDP (n = 31), and HC (n = 32) performed a novel eye movement task to assess predictive pursuit as well as a standard visuospatial measure of working memory. Individuals with SZ and BDP both showed reduced predictive pursuit gain compared with HC (p < .05). Moreover, each patient group showed worse performance in visuospatial working memory compared with control subjects (p < .05). A strong correlation (r = .53, p = .007) was found between predictive pursuit gain and working memory in HC, a relationship that showed a trend correlation within the BDP group but not among SZ. Individuals with SZ and BDP showed similar deficits in predictive pursuit, suggesting that this alteration could be a characteristic trait of the psychosis domain. The correlation between predictive pursuit and working memory in HC supports the assumption that working memory is related to predictive pursuit eye movements; however, the degradation of working memory in people with psychosis disrupts its association with eye-tracking behavior.

"Splitting of the Mind" Revisited: Recent Neuroimaging Evidence for Functional Dysconnection in Schizophrenia and Its Relation to Symptoms

"Splitting of the Mind" Revisited: Recent Neuroimaging Evidence for Functional Dysconnection in Schizophrenia and Its Relation to Symptoms