Odd Beliefs Research Articles

SU54. Shared Architecture of Dimensional Psychotic Symptoms Across Psychosis Spectrum Disorders: Impact on Functional Outcomes and Neurocognition

Abstract Background: Psychosis spectrum disorders share significant overlap in symptoms, biomarkers, genetic factors, outcomes, and treatment response. Moreover, within each disorder, there is significant heterogeneity in symptom profiles, neurocognitive, and everyday functioning. This has lead to recent efforts, in line with the Research Domain Criteria (RDoC), to develop novel classifications based on dimensions that cut across traditional diagnostic boundaries. Whether there are homogeneous subgroups in bipolar disorder (BD) with distinct psychotic symptom profiles is unknown. Moreover, the impact of these subgroups on neurocognitive and everyday functioning is also unknown. We aimed to (1) cluster BD patients in homogeneous subgroups based on psychotic symptom profiles; (2) describe clinical, neurocognitive, and functional characteristics of each subgroup; and (3) test whether the subgroups extend across the psychosis spectrum (to patients with schizotypal personality disorder, SPD). Methods: Sample: 138 patients with BD I or II; 282 patients with SPD. Diagnosis: SCID, SIDP-IV. Psychotic symptoms: Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire, SPQ; a multidimensional measure of psychosis proneness that captures the full range from normal to abnormal, including subthreshold symptoms. Neurocognition: MATRICS Consensus Cognitive Battery (MCCB); Disability: World Health Organization Disability Assessment Schedule (WHODAS-II). With hierarchical cluster analyses, we tested for homogeneous subgroups in each sample (BD, SPD patients) based on the 9 SPQ subscales. To determine the impact of psychosis symptom profile on outcome, we used ANOVAs to compare the clusters on neurocognitive and everyday functioning. Results: In BD, we identified 3 clusters: (1) high propensity to positive symptoms, with significantly higher scores on ideas of reference, suspiciousness, unusual perceptions, odd beliefs, odd behavior, and odd speech than the other 2 clusters; (2) high negative symptoms and social dysfunction, with high scores on excess social anxiety and lack of friends; and (3) mild psychosis symptom profile, with the lowest scores across all SPQ subscales. Subgroup 1 (high positive symptoms) scored significantly lower in all cognitive areas (MATRICS composite, F = 3.72; df = 2; P = .027) and had lower premorbid IQ (F = 5.6; df = 124; P = .005) and significantly higher disability (WHODAS, F = 9.19; df = 2; P < .001) compared with the other 2 subgroups. In the SPD sample, we found a subgroup structure that was highly consistent with that described above. Conclusion: Our finding of a common structure of psychotic symptom profiles across different psychosis spectrum disorders supports the dimensional nature of the propensity to positive symptoms in a continuum across diagnostic boundaries. Our results further highlight the potential implications that this classification system may have on outcome.

Self-reference in psychosis and depression: a language marker of illness.

Language use is of increasing interest in the study of mental illness. Analytical approaches range from phenomenological and qualitative to formal computational quantitative methods. Practically, the approach may have utility in predicting clinical outcomes. We harnessed a real-world sample (blog entries) from groups with psychosis, strong beliefs, odd beliefs, illness, mental illness and/or social isolation to validate and extend laboratory findings about lexical differences between psychosis and control subjects. We describe the results of two experiments using Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count software to assess word category frequencies. In experiment 1, we compared word use in psychosis and control subjects in the laboratory (23 per group), and related results to subject symptoms. In experiment 2, we examined lexical patterns in blog entries written by people with psychosis and eight comparison groups. In addition to between-group comparisons, we used factor analysis followed by clustering to discern the contributions of strong belief, odd belief and illness identity to lexical patterns. Consistent with others' work, we found that first-person pronouns, biological process words and negative emotion words were more frequent in psychosis language. We tested lexical differences between bloggers with psychosis and multiple relevant comparison groups. Clustering analysis revealed that word use frequencies did not group individuals with strong or odd beliefs, but instead grouped individuals with any illness (mental or physical). Pairing of laboratory and real-world samples reveals that lexical markers previously identified as specific language changes in depression and psychosis are probably markers of illness in general.

Childhood trauma as a risk factor for the onset of subclinical psychotic experiences: Exploring the mediating effect of stress sensitivity in a cross-sectional epidemiological community study

Childhood trauma is a risk factor for the onset of schizophrenic psychosis. Because the psychosis phenotype can be described as a continuum with varying levels of severity and persistence, childhood trauma might likewise increase the risk for psychotic experiences below the diagnostic threshold. But the impact of stressful experiences depends upon its subjective appraisal. Therefore, varying degrees of stress sensitivity possibly mediate how childhood trauma impacts in the end upon the occurrence of subclinical psychotic experiences.We investigated this research question in a representative community cohort of 1500 participants. A questionnaire, comprising five domains of physical and emotional neglect, as well as physical, emotional, and sexual abuse, was used to assess childhood trauma. Based on different symptoms of subclinical psychotic experiences, we conducted a latent profile analysis (LPA) to derive distinct profiles for such experiences. Path modeling was performed to identify the direct and indirect (via stress sensitivity) pathways from childhood trauma to subclinical psychotic experiences.The LPA revealed four classes — unaffected, anomalous perceptions, odd beliefs and behavior, and combined anomalous perceptions/odd beliefs and behavior, that – except for sexual abuse – were all linked to childhood trauma. Moreover, except for physical abuse, childhood trauma was significantly associated with stress sensitivity. Thus, our results revealed that the pathways from emotional neglect/abuse and physical neglect to subclinical psychotic experiences were mediated by stress sensitivity.In conclusion, we can state that subclinical psychotic experiences are affected by childhood traumatic experiences in particular through the pathway of a heightened subjective stress appraisal.

Translational Biomedicine and Dichotomous Correlations of Masking

A hierarchically organized system is based on the predictive coding model of neural function in which a primary purpose of neural interactions is to minimize prediction error by masking. Neural data suggests that this is not a simple continuum and that non-clinical odd beliefs may be mediated by a striatal system which is distinct from the cause of pathological delusions in right frontal cortex. In psychotic subjects it was referred on so called “divided Self”, which are interpreting themselves as a machine or robot, not clear as humans. The goal of translational medicine (TM) is to combine disciplines, resources, expertise, and techniques within these pillars to promote enhancements in prevention, diagnosis, and therapies. Accordingly, TM is a highly interdisciplinary field, the primary goal of which is to coalesce assets of various natures within the individual pillars in order to improve the global healthcare system significantly. It results in general knowledge and understanding of nature and its laws.

The relation between schizotypy and early attention to rejecting interactions: The influence of neuroticism

Objectives: Schizotypy relates to rejection sensitivity (anxiety reflecting an expectancy of social exclusion) and neuroticism (excessive evaluation of negative emotions). Positive schizotypy (e.g., perceptual aberrations and odd beliefs) and negative schizotypy (e.g., social and physical anhedonia) could relate to altered attention to rejection because of neuroticism. Methods: Forty-one healthy individuals were assessed on positive and negative schizotypy and neuroticism, and event-related potentials during rejecting, accepting and neutral scenes. Participants were categorised into high, moderate and low neuroticism groups. Using temporo-spatial principal components analyses, P200 (peak latency =290 ms) and P300 amplitudes (peak latency = 390 ms) were measured, reflecting mobilisation of attention and early attention, respectively. Results: Scalp-level and cortical source analysis revealed elevated fronto-parietal N300/P300 amplitude and P200-related dorsal anterior cingulate current density during rejection than acceptance/neutral scenes. Positive schizotypy related inversely to parietal P200 amplitude during rejection. Negative schizotypy related positively to P200 middle occipital current density. Negative schizotypy related positively to parietal P300, where the association was stronger in high and moderate, than low, neuroticism groups. Conclusions: Positive and negative schizotypy relate divergently to attention to rejection. Positive schizotypy attenuates, but negative schizotypy increases rejection-related mobilisation of attention. Negative schizotypy increases early attention to rejection partly due to elevated neuroticism.

Answering some phenomenal challenges to the prediction error model of delusions.

Delusions are a challenge; a menagerie of odd beliefs with a diverse set of differential diagnoses and candidate pathologies (1). Their phenomenology has led many to deem them un-understandable (2). On the other hand, their susceptibility to treatment with D2 receptor antagonists has led many clinicians and scientists to consider them understood.

Assessing sub-clinical psychosis phenotypes in the general population — A multidimensional approach

Several studies have demonstrated that expression of a psychosis phenotype can be observed below the threshold of its clinical detection. To date, however, no conceptual certainty has been reported for the validity and reliability of sub-clinical psychosis. Our main objectives were to assess the prevalence rates and severity of various psychosis symptoms in a representative community sample. Furthermore, we wanted to analyze which latent factors are depicted by several currently used psychosis questionnaires. We also examined how those latent factors for sub-clinical psychosis are linked to psychosocial factors, normal personality traits, and coping abilities related to chronic stress.Most of the eight subscales from the Paranoia Checklist and the Structured Interview for Assessing Perceptual Anomalies had a very similar type of distribution, i.e., an inverse Gaussian (Wald) distribution. This supported the notion of a continuity of psychotic symptoms, which we would expect to find for continuously distributed symptoms within the general population. Sub-clinical psychosis can be reduced to two different factors — one representing odd beliefs about the world and odd behavior, and the other one representing anomalous perceptions (such as hallucinations). Persons with odd beliefs and behavior are under greater burden and more susceptible to psychosocial risks than are persons with anomalous perceptions. These sub-clinical psychosis syndromes are also related to stable personality traits.In conclusion, we obtained strong support for the notion that there is no natural cut-off separating psychotic illness from good health. Sub-clinical psychosis of any kind is not trivial because it is associated with various types of social disability.

Associations between schizotypy and belief in conspiracist ideation

Previous studies have reported associations between conspiracist ideation and domain-level facets of schizotypy, but less is known about associations with lower-order facets. In the present study, 447 adults completed measures of conspiracist ideation and the Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire (SPQ), consisting of nine subscales grouped into four domains. Results of a multiple regression showed that two domains of the SPQ significantly predicted conspiracist ideation, but multicollinearity was a limiting factor. In a second regression, we found that the subscales of Odd Beliefs or Magical Thinking and Ideas of Reference significantly predicted conspiracist ideation, without any multicollinearity constraints. We interpret these results as implicating two specific lower-order facets of schizotypy in belief in conspiracy theories. We further contrast the present results with previous studies indicating associations between conspiracist ideation and paranormal beliefs.

Neural processing of social rejection: The role of schizotypal personality traits

A fear of being rejected can cause perceptions of more insecurity and stress in close relationships. Healthy individuals activate the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) when experiencing social rejection, while those who are vulnerable to depression deactivate the dACC presumably to downregulate salience of rejection cues and minimize distress. Schizotypal individuals, characterized by unusual perceptual experiences and/or odd beliefs, are more rejection sensitive than normal. We tested the hypothesis, for the first time, that individuals with high schizotypy also have an altered dACC response to rejection stimuli. Twenty-six healthy individuals, 14 with low schizotypy (LS) and 12 with high schizotypy (HS), viewed depictions of rejection and acceptance and neutral scenes while undergoing functional MRI. Activation maps in LS and HS groups during each image type were compared using SPM5, and their relation to participant mood and subjective ratings of the images was examined. During rejection relative to neutral scenes, LS activated and HS deactivated the bilateral dACC, right superior frontal gyrus, and left ventral prefrontal cortex. Across both groups, a temporo-occipito-parieto-cerebellar network was active during rejection, and a left fronto-parietal network during acceptance, relative to neutral scenes, and the bilateral lingual gyrus during rejection relative to acceptance scenes. Our finding of dACC-dorso-ventral PFC activation in LS, but deactivation in HS individuals when perceiving social rejection scenes suggests that HS individuals attach less salience to and distance themselves from such stimuli. This may enable them to cope with their higher-than-normal sensitivity to rejection.

FC12-01 - Neural processing of social rejection: The role of schizotypal personality trait

A fear of being rejected can cause perceptions of more insecurity and stress in close relationships. Healthy individuals activate the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) when experiencing social rejection, while those who are vulnerable to depression deactivate the dACC presumably in order to down-regulate salience of rejection cues and minimize distress. Schizotypal individuals, characterised by unusual perceptual experiences and/or odd beliefs, are more rejection sensitive than normal. We tested the hypothesis, for the first time, that individuals with high schizotypy also have an altered dACC response to rejection stimuli. Twenty-six healthy individuals, 14 with low schizotypy (LS) and 12 with high schizotypy (HS), viewed depictions of rejection and acceptance and neutral scenes while undergoing functional MRI. Activation maps in LS and HS groups during each image type were compared using SPM5 and their relation to participant mood and subjective ratings of the images was examined. During rejection relative to neutral scenes, LS activated and HS deactivated the bilateral dACC, right superior frontal gyrus and left ventral prefrontal cortex. Across both groups, a temporo-occipito-parieto-cerebellar network was active during rejection, and a left fronto-parietal network during acceptance, relative to neutral scenes, and the bilateral lingual gyrus during rejection relative to acceptance scenes. Our finding of dACC-dorso-ventral PFC activation in LS, but deactivation in HS individuals when perceiving social rejection scenes suggests that HS individuals attach less salience to and distance themselves from such stimuli. This may enable them to cope with their higher-than-normal sensitivity to rejection.

Validation de la version française du questionnaire de personnalité schizotypique de Raine dans la population adolescente : étude de la structure factorielle

This article aims to validate the schizotypal personality questionnaire in a sample of French speaking adolescents. Because early schizotypal manifestations are predictive of psychosis-proneness, reliable self-report measures are crucial for early detection of vulnerability to schizophrenia during adolescence. Unlike most existing self-reports, the questionnaire de personnalité schizotypique (SPQ) assesses individual differences in all nine feature of DSM-IV schizotypal personality (i.e. ideas of reference, excessive social anxiety, odd beliefs, unusual perceptual experience, odd behaviour, no close friends, odd speech, constricted affect and suspiciousness). Furthermore, it yields dimensional scores concerning the main schizotypal factors, which represent valuable information for the clinician's case formulation and can be used as a screening instrument in the general population. Our sample consisted of 174 adolescents (98 girls) between 12 and 17 years old. All completed the SPQ 74-item self-report. Participants were recruited in secondary schools in Switzerland, and through the child and adolescent community outpatient psychiatric service (office médico-pédagogique) affiliated to the University of Geneva's Psychiatry Department and to the Canton of Geneva Education Department. A confirmatory factorial analysis was conducted on our sample to test nine competing models of SPQ. The 3-factor model of Raine et al. was compared to concurrent 2, 3, and 4-factor models. Simple structure models of Raine et al. and Stefanis et al. were also tested. The following observations were highlighted in our results: (1) goodness-of-fit indices are better for structures allowing cross loadings than for simple structures; (2) amongst the simple structures, the best goodness-of-fit index was obtained for the Raine model and (3) the fit between our data and the Raine model is improved by a cross loading for suspiciousness subscale. The latter seems problematic for the global data fitting. This led us to test simple structures models of Siever and Gunderson, Raine et al., and Stefanis et al., based on eight subscales rather than nine. Without suspiciousness subscale, goodness-of-fit indices are enhanced in these three models. The 3-factor model yields the clearest and most reliable results in comparison with other competing models. In summary, the best goodness-of-fit indices were obtained for the 3-factor Raine model. Goodness-of-fit indices could be improved by the exclusion of the suspiciousness scale. Consistent with earlier analyses by Raine et al. and Dumas et al., our data confirm the 3-factor model of the SPQ (cognitive-perceptive; interpersonal; disorganized) in a sample of French speaking adolescents. Our analyses confirm that two dimensions are insufficient to explain the structure of schizotypy during adolescence. These results further suggest the stability of a 3-factor structure during lifespan. We note that the inclusion of the suspiciousness subscales engenders statistical issues. Most studies to date have dealt with these issues by performing a cross-loading with this subscale, or by the inclusion of a paranoid factor which is linked with the negative and the cognitive-perceptive factors. We found that the most statistically sound strategy was reached without the inclusion of the suspiciousness subscale. Future studies with larger samples could investigate the SPQ structure at an item-level, which carries the benefit of reduced restrictions on the factorial analysis. In conclusion, the current study shows that the French version SPQ constitutes a reliable self-report questionnaire for the assessment of schizotypal trait expression during adolescence that may assist in the evaluation of psychosis proneness in youths.

P02-243 - Neurocognition and temperament in borderline and schizotypal personality disorder

ObjectiveExplore the neurocognitive and temperament profile of borderline personality disorder (BPD) and schizotypal personality disorder (SPD) to better understand their underlying neurobiology for improved treatment.Methods17 BPD, 16 SPD, and 15 healthy controls (HCs) were given a comprehensive neuropsychological battery (CANTAB), the Iowa Gambling Task, a time perception task, and questionnaires of impulsivity, temperament, emotion, and frontal behavior (measures orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) dysfunction).ResultsBPD and SPD patients performed significantly worse on the delayed match to sample (DMS) task compared to HCs, but had preserved function on decision-making, planning, time perception and attention tasks. SPD patients performed significantly worse on spatial working memory (SWM) tasks, and had higher religious commitment scores than HC and BPD groups, which correlated with their SWM deficits. BPD patients had significantly more frontal behaviors and emotions than both groups, which correlated with their emotionality, impulsivity, BPD symptoms, and temperament traits.ConclusionsBoth BPD and SPD groups had a deficit on the DMS task, sensitive to medial temporal lobe (MTL) dysfunction, but only SPD patients had SWM deficits, indicative of dorsolateral frontal cortex (DLFC) dysfunction, which correlated with their high religious commitment in line with their odd beliefs and magical thinking. Only BPD patients had frontal behavior deficits, related to OFC dysfunction, which positively correlated with their emotionality, impulsivity, and temperament traits. While both disorders may have a deficit in MTL function, DLFC dysfunction may contribute to SPD symptoms, and OFC dysfunction to BPD symptoms, suggesting treatment should target unique prefrontal cortex regions respectively.

Successful Retrial of ECT Two Months After ECT-Induced Takotsubo Cardiomyopathy

heart failure; however, recovery of cardiac function is often complete within the first week following the insult. Cardiac enzymes may be mildly elevated, but on cardiac catheterization there is usually no evidence of coronary artery disease, or only "mild luminal irregularities" may be noted (7). Contraction band necrosis may be seen on biopsy in the more serious cases. The cause of takotsubo cardiomyopathy is unknown, but several mechanisms have been suggested, including ischemia from coronary artery spasm, microvascular spasm, and direct myocyte injury (5).

Aripiprazole in Schizotypal Personality

Sir: Schizotypal personality disorder (SPD) is characterized by odd, eccentric behavior; inappropriate or constricted affect; odd beliefs or magical thinking; circumstantial, metaphorical, or stereotyped thinking manifested by odd speech; anxiety in social situations; and cognitive or perceptual distortions.1 Studies have been conducted on the efficacy of haloperidol,2 thiothixene,3 olanzapine,4 and risperidone5 in SPD. However, efficacy of aripiprazole in SPD has not been reported. Aripiprazole is a novel antipsychotic with a unique mechanism of action. It is a partial agonist of D2 and D3 dopamine receptors and 5-HT1A serotonin receptors, which are, respectively, responsible for its efficacy on positive, negative, and cognitive symptoms of schizophrenia and its antidepressant and antianxiety actions.6–8 Hence, it is called a dopamine-serotonin system stabilizer.9,10 Aripiprazole has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in the treatment of schizophrenia. A search of English-language publications in PubMed using the keywords schizotypal personality disorder and aripiprazole retrieved no published reports or articles. Herein, we describe a patient with SPD of 5 years’ illness duration who had never been treated with any medications and who responded to treatment with aripiprazole. Case report. Mr. A, a 22-year-old engineering student of middle-class socioeconomic status and urban background, presented to our hospital in August 2007 with an insidious onset and continuous course of illness of 5 years’ duration characterized by odd and eccentric behavior, oddities in speech, avoidance of social situations, deteriorating academic performance, idiosyncratic repetitive behaviors, and magical thinking. His family members were concerned about his odd and eccentric behavior, social dysfunction, and academic decline. The above symptoms could not be attributed to any clear-cut psychotic disorders, mood disorders, substance use disorders, or general medical conditions. He had never received treatment for the symptoms. The patient's history and family history were noncontributory. Structured assessment conducted at baseline using the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis I Disorders11 and Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis II Personality Disorders12 revealed that Mr. A had schizotypal personality disorder. The Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire (SPQ)13 revealed social anxiety, odd beliefs, odd behaviors, blunted affect, suspiciousness, lack of close friends, and magical thinking. A baseline score of 4 on the Clinical Global Impressions-Severity of Illness scale (CGI-S)14 was noted. Other baseline psychodiagnostic assessments were also conducted, such as the Object Sorting Test, Thematic Apperception Test, and Rorschach Inkblot Test, which revealed the absence of pathognomonic signs of psychosis. After giving informed consent, Mr. A was started on treatment with aripiprazole 10 mg at night. At 2-month (week 8) follow-up, the patient reported a 70% decrease in his symptoms, started attending his engineering college regularly, and showed interest in his studies. His family members reported marked improvement in his social and academic functioning. They also reported that his odd ideas, eccentric behaviors, magical thinking, and suspiciousness were reduced to minimal. His interaction with friends and his mood also improved. His CGI-S score was 3 (mildly ill), and his CGI-Improvement score was 2 (showing much improvement). This patient with SPD had a 5-year duration of untreated illness and was assessed with structured instruments. He responded to treatment with 10 mg of aripiprazole. Currently, thiothixene, haloperidol, risperidone, and olanzapine have been documented to be effective in treatment of SPD. This case report assumes importance in the light of the paucity of aripiprazole studies in SPD. However, the choice of antipsychotic medications is largely based on side effect profile. Available data on aripiprazole reveal that it is an effective medication with a benign adverse effect profile.9,10 Aripiprazole, being a dopamine- serotonin system stabilizer, is hence an ideal drug to target the odd and eccentric behavior, stereotyped thinking, social anxiety symptoms, and obsessive symptoms of SPD. Future double-blind, placebo-controlled studies examining the effectiveness of aripiprazole in the treatment of SPD are needed. Ajay Kumar, M.Phil. Ravikant Pinjarkar, M.Phil. Nitin Anand, M.A., M.Phil. M. Manjula, M.Phil., Ph.D. Department of Mental Health and Social Psychology Suresh Bada Math, M.D., D.N.B., P.G.D.M.L.E. Department of Psychiatry, National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, (Deemed University), Bangalore, India

Sustained improvement of obsessive–compulsive disorder by deep brain stimulation in a woman with residual schizophrenia

Co-occurrence of obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) and schizophrenia is not rare (Eisen et al., 1997). Given that the obsessional content is not related to psychotic subject matter, both disorders can be regarded as delimitable diagnostic entities (Bottas et al., 2005). Recently, a number of case reports and small case series have demonstrated that deep brain stimulation (DBS) targeting the fronto-striato-thalamic circuit can have beneficial effects on OCD (Abelson et al., 2005; Greenberg et al., 2006; Sturm et al., 2003). DBS treatment of patients with current or past psychotic disorders has not yet been reported. Here, we present a comprehensive clinical evaluation of a woman with intractable OCD and residual symptoms of schizophrenia that were treated with unilateral DBS of the right nucleus accumbens (NAc), including neuropsychological long-term follow-up, neurophysiological measurements and functional brain imaging. This 51-yr-old right-handed woman suffered from a severely disabling, chronic and intractable form of OCD with excessive hand washing, cleaning, rearrangement of objects and compulsory praying [Yale–Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale (YBOCS) score 32/40, 1 month prior to treatment]. Psychosocial functioning as measured by the GAF (Global Assessment of Functioning) scale was severely impaired (31/100). The symptoms started during childhood and accumulated during her early twenties. Obsession consisted of preoccupation with thoughts about guilt and purgation. Later in the course of the disease, psychotic symptoms (delusions, hallucinations, disorganized behaviour) meeting DSM-IV criteria for schizophrenia occurred transiently. The remaining presence of a few odd beliefs, minor paranoid ideation and disorganized behaviour in an attenuated form that were unrelated to the obsessions and compulsions led to the diagnosis of residual schizophrenia according to DSM-IV using SCID (Structured Clinical …

Schizotypal personality in mature adults

The goal of the present study was to examine the influence of age and gender on the factor structure of the Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire ( Raine, 1991). Schizotypal traits were assessed in a random sample of mature, adult community volunteers (average age 40 years). Four competing models of the latent factor structure were tested in the full sample ( N = 352). The resulting three-factor model was then assessed separately in males and females and in stratified subsamples, reflecting three age cohorts. The results showed that, in mature adults, males had higher scores than females on No Close Friends and Constricted Affect whilst females had higher scores on Social Anxiety and Odd Beliefs subscales. Older adults were also characterized by lower total SPQ scores than those reported previously for younger adults. Despite the presence of age and sex-related differences in mean SPQ scores, a three-factor model of schizotypal personality best characterized the SPQ responses from mature adults, replicating that reported previously in high-school and university-aged samples. The implications of these findings of SPQ factor structure invariance, across age and gender, are discussed with reference to studies investigating neurocognitive correlates of schizotypy (i.e. endophenotypes).

Awareness of the Functioning of One's Own Limbs Mediated by the Insular Cortex?

Normally, we are aware of the current functions of our arms and legs. However, this self-evident status may change dramatically after brain damage. Some patients with "anosognosia" typically are convinced that their limbs function normally, although they have obvious motor defects after stroke. Such patients may experience their own paretic limbs as strange or as not belonging to them and may even attribute ownership to another person and try to push their paralyzed limb out of bed. These odd beliefs have been attributed to disturbances somewhere in the right hemisphere. Here, we use lesion mapping in 27 stroke patients to show that the right posterior insula is commonly damaged in patients with anosognosia for hemiplegia/hemiparesis but is significantly less involved in hemiplegic/hemiparetic patients without anosognosia. The function of the posterior insular cortex has been controversially discussed. Recent neuroimaging results in healthy subjects revealed specific involvement of this area in the subject's feeling of being versus not being involved in a movement. Our finding corresponds with this observation and suggests that the insular cortex is integral to self-awareness and to one's beliefs about the functioning of body parts.

'Local Characters': Eccentricity and the North-east in the Nineteenth Century

This essay explores some of the social, political, and cultural meanings of 'eccentricity' in nineteenth-century England. It does this through examining the treatment of 'local characters' extensively recorded in North-East histories, newspapers, and ballads, and depicted in visual material in the period c. 1800–1901. The first part examines the typology emerging from these media; and demonstrates how mental and physical abnormality, transgression of social mores, and odd beliefs, were classed as 'eccentric'. A study of representations of eccentricity, many of which were commercially available, forms the second part, supported by illustrations relating to popular figures such as William Purvis, or Blind Willy, of Newcastle. Eccentricities were identified across the region, in rural areas as well as in the 'public spaces' of Durham, Sunderland, and Newcastle. The final part relates this chronicling of odd characters to Victorian culture; the region's social history; and local patriotism across the period, but especially the late Victorian period, when the popularity of local history ensured a prominent place for eccentrics as emblematic of the quaint past in the North-East (and, it is indicated, elsewhere). Finally, the uses of eccentric characters are briefly discussed more broadly in terms of moralism and stigmatism.

The Mask of Anarchy: The Destruction of Liberia and the Religious Dimension of an African Civil War, by Stephen Ellis (New York: New York University Press, 1999); Expectations of Modernity: Myths and Meanings of Urban Life on the Zambian Copperbelt, by James Ferguson (Berkeley and Los Angeles, University of California Press, 1999).

African studies, at least in its northern versions, has historically been about mediating Africa to the rest of the world. Those of us who teach in the United States are still stalked by battles from the 1960s about whether or not the study of Africa is intellectually viable; many of us claim that the real struggle is against stereotypes and correcting racist myths about Africa. Indeed, the syllabus for my undergraduate African history survey has in its introduction a few lines about how the stereotypes about nineteenth-century Africa—tribal warfare, superstition, poverty and disease—have hindered our ability to understand Africa's past and present. In their research, scholars have grappled—in varying degrees of course—with the question of how to represent Africa, and how to translate experience there to the rest of the world. Over the last forty years, this has meant some impressive apologies for repressive regimes and some imaginative accounts of social and economic conditions. If only one looked closely enough, many argued, one could see civil society/creative outpourings/new social arrangements emerging amidst growing poverty and disappointment. Such statements are anything but cynical, however: they are as much a part of the struggle against the older stereotypes as my upper division survey course claims to be. We are wary of showing an Africa that others might think awash with odd beliefs, or the site of meaningless violence, or as having politics that are more corrupt than consensual. Besides, what we study in Africa has been the subject of much criticism within the field, and many scholars also struggle against claims that we are exoticizing Africa, or, as in a famous critique of a Rhodes-Livingstone Institute anthropologist (see Ferguson, 28–29), that we study what is irrelevant to African lives—like leisure—instead of the colonial oppression under which Africans toiled. Many scholars have taken this critique quite seriously, and have approached the study of African songs, gossip, and sexuality with some defensiveness; others have focused on colonialism and its myriad evils to the point that independent Africa (i.e., the last thirty to forty years) is rarely an object of study in and of itself, but instead is the direct result of colonialism (i.e., the colonial legacy). The result has been at best linear, and at worst paternalistic. How Africans understand their own contemporary dilemmas has rarely been an object of enquiry.

An experimental investigation of odd beliefs: individual differences in non-normative belief conviction

Two competing theories for the endorsement of odd beliefs were tested within an experimental setting. After completing a pursuit rotor task and receiving either expectancy-confirming or disconfirming performance feedback, participants were asked to rate their conviction in a series of causal attributions that had been assessed by judges with regard to belief normativeness. The psychosis proneness scores of 163 (89 male and 74 female) college students were found to predict the concurrent endorsement of empirically defined abnormal/odd causal attributions, even after controlling for depression scores. However, conviction ratings were unrelated to both the endorsement of normal causal attributions and to the expectancy confirming/disconfirming nature of the performance feedback. The results demonstrate, within an analog experiment, the relative importance of individual differences in the endorsement of non-normative beliefs.