Lecture 12
Schizophrenia
Lecture Outline
I. Introduction
II. The Concept of Schizophrenia
A. Kraepelin
B. Bleuler
C. Schneider
D. US-UK Cross National Project
E. A More Conservative US
III.DSM-III
A. Duration
B. Symptoms
C. Age
D. Organic Exclusion
E. Subtyping
1. Catatonic
2. Disorganized
3. Paranoid
4. Undifferentiated
5. Residual
IV. Conclusions
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I. Introduction
We have thus far examined psychological disturbances that, while
potentially quite debilitating, are typically "ambulatory" in nature:
the person can usually still function, there is usually no serious loss
of contact with reality. Today we turn to Schizophrenia, a class of
psychological disorders that is perhaps the ultimate in psychological
breakdown (Carson, et al., 1988). The individual typically has marked
breaks with and distortions of reality. As we shall see, Schizophrenia
"strikes at the very heart of what we consider the essence of the
person" (Carpenter, 1987, p.3) Such a disturbance is often termed
psychotic to distinguish it from the milder "neurotic" disorders
(Anxiety and Mood disorders). Today, we will review some of the issues
and controversies regarding Schizophrenia, as well as briefly look at
how the DSM-III-R defines the concept.
Schizophrenia affects all areas of functioning: thought,
perception, emotion, behavior. A Schizophrenic individual suffers from
impairment in multiple areas of functioning. The following is a list of
those symptoms identified by the DSM-III-R.
(Note: Your text goes into much more detail for each of these areas, so
we won't spend a lot of time on them in lecture. Make sure you review
them carefully).
A. Content of Thoughts: delusions (false beliefs). Eg: Others
able to read my thoughts (thought broadcasting), thoughts are being
placed in my head (thought insertion), other people/beings are
controlling me
B. Form of Thoughts: Eg: loose associations (one thought has
little to do with the previous or forthcoming thoughts), poverty of
content (talks a lot, but says very little), unique/made-up words
(neologisms), clanging (speech follows meaningless rhymes. (See
Handout 12-1).
[Note: The specificity of thought disturbances is not
altogether clear (disturbances of thought occur to varying
degrees in many psychological disorders [Rattenbury,
Silverstein, DeWolfe, et al., 1983)].
C. Perception: hallucinations, especially auditory. Eg: hearing
voices.
D. Affect: flat and/or inappropriate emotional responses. Eg:
extreme silliness, or an utter lack of emotion.
E. Sense of Self: no sense of self, of being an individual. No
sense of meaning.
F. Volition: inadequate self-initiated behavior. Eg: inability to
meet goals or complete tasks.
G. Interpersonal Relations: withdrawn, detached (sometimes called
"autism") or excessive clinging, dependency, and intrusiveness.
H. Psycho-Motor Behavior: unresponsive or bizarre responses to the
environment. Eg: Catatonia (such as extreme rigidity or stupor),
overexcited activity, strange faces.
The final, overarching diagnostic criterion is that the person's
functioning has declined markedly below the highest level of functioning
achieved prior to the disorder. This criterion is included to
discriminate between people with Schizophrenia and those with more
isolated problems (such as someone who, although experiencing some form
of delusion, shows no reduction in social or work functioning).
Schizophrenia typically involves impairment in multiple areas of
functioning. Because the impairment is often so pervasive,
Schizophrenic individuals often require prolonged or repeated
hospitalization.
Case Study: (Susan, a young woman, placed by her school in a class for
the emotionally disturbed): She talked at length about her
interests and occupations. She said she made a robot in the
basement that ran amok and was about to cause a great deal
of damage, but she was able to stop it by remote control.
She claims to have built the robot from spare computer
parts, which she acquired from the local museum. When
pressed on details of how this worked, she became
increasingly vague, and when asked to draw a picture of one
of her inventions, drew a picture of an overhead railway and
went into what appeared to be complex mathematical
calculations to substantiate the structural details, but
which in fact consisted of meaningless repetitions of
symbols (eg: plus, minus, divide, multiply). When the
interviewer expressed some gentle incredulity, she blandly
replied that many people did not believe that she was a
supergenius. She also talked about her unusual ability to
hear things other people cannot hear, and said she was in
communication with some sort of creature. She thought she
might be haunted, or perhaps the creature was a being from
another planet. She could hear his voice talking to her and
asking her questions (Spitzer, Skodol, Gibbon & Williams,
1981, p221-222).
Sex ratio: Schizophrenia is apparently equally common in both sexes
(APA, 1987).
Prevalence: Lifetime prevalence rates have been reported to be around
0.2% to almost 1% in Europe and Asia. Studies in the U.S. (which have
traditionally used broader definitions - see below) report somewhat
higher rates (APA, 1987).
II. The Concept of Schizophrenia (Andreasen, 1987a, 1987b; Neale &
Oltmanns, 1980)
Schizophrenia occurs in almost all societies - it is a virtually
universally accepted concept (Andreasen, 1987a). Nevertheless, there is
debate over exactly how to define the concept. Typically, the
controversy revolves around how to determine the boundaries of the
disorder: What are the "rules" for deciding what is and what isn't
Schizophrenia?
A. Kraepelin: No discussion of Schizophrenia would be complete
without recognizing the role played by the German psychiatrist,
Emil Kraepelin during the late 1800's and early 1900's. Kraepelin
was the first to identify and comprehensively describe the disorder
that we now call Schizophrenia. Kraepelin used the term "dementia
praecox", a Latin phrase meaning "mental deterioration at an early
age". For Kraepelin, the early age of onset was a defining
criteria of dementia praecox (ie: Schizophrenia). An additional
defining characteristic was a deteriorating course, that is, it is
only Schizophrenia if the person gets progressively worse. While
Kraepelin's definition incorporates observable symptoms as well,
the emphasis was on early onset/deteriorating course as the
defining features. Thus, Kraepelin's approach is fairly narrow.
B. Bleuler: The Swiss psychiatrist, Eugen Bleuler (a contemporary
of Kraepelin's) rejected Kraepelin's emphasis on early onset and
deteriorating course. He did much to broaden the concept, as well
as coining a new term: "Schizophrenia". For Bleuler, Schizophrenia
was a group of disorders, including mild and severe cases, those
with a favorable outcome and those with a deteriorating course, and
those which were acute and those which were chronic. He attempted
to identify the core psychological feature unifying this group of
disorders, and decided it must be the loosening of associations.
That is, the associations typically joining thought, communication,
actions, and emotions become disconnected, giving rise to the often
times bizarre behaviors. (Schizophrenia literally means "split
mind": from the Greek schizien for split, and phren for mind). The
ultimate split is seen in the person's disconnection with the
outside world.
This approach was the "prevailing wisdom" in the United States
for much of the 50's and 60's, where Bleuler's definition was
further broadened to include various other inferred mental process,
in addition to loosening associations.
C. Schneider: Meanwhile, back in Europe, there was a push to
narrow the meaning of Schizophrenia away from the broad Bleulerian
conceptions of America. European psychiatrists were worrying that
the definitions were becoming so broad that Schizophrenia was
becoming a meaningless term. Work by people like Kurt Schneider
was gaining importance. The emphasis was on identifying observable
symptoms that would indicate the presence of Schizophrenia ("first
rank symptoms" in Schneider's terminology) and avoiding inferred
processes.
D. US-UK Cross National Project: This distinction between broad
(Bleulerian) and narrow (Kraepelinian) conceptions of Schizophrenia
is dramatically illustrated in the US-UK Cross National Project
conducted by a team of researchers in the early 1970's. One part
of this study compared the frequencies of diagnoses made in London
hospitals and New York hospitals:
New York London
Schizophrenia 118 (62%) 59 (34%)
Mood Disorder 13 (7%) 68 (38%)
Anxiety Disorder 5 (3%) 10 (6%)
Personality 2 (1%) 8 (5%)
Disorder
Other 54 (28%) 29 (17%)
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192 174
The project researchers made their own diagnoses of the two sets of
patients and found that the actual characteristics of the
inpatients in the US hospitals were virtually identical to those of
the British inpatients:
New York London
Schizophrenia 56 (28%) 61 (34%)
Mood Disorder 62 (31%) 76 (44%)
Anxiety Disorder 3 (2%) 7 (3%)
Personality 8 (3%) 5 (3%)
Disorder
Other 63 (33%) 25 (13%)
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192 174
As can be seen, the US hospital staff were much more likely to make
the diagnosis of Schizophrenia than were the British staff.
E. A More Conservative U.S.: Spurred by studies like the Cross
National Project, psychologists, psychiatrists and others in the
mental health field became increasingly critical of the broad
American definition of Schizophrenia.
The "Feighner Criteria": During the 1970's a group of Washington
University (Saint Louis) researchers (Feighner and his associates)
developed a more comprehensive set of criteria for defining
Schizophrenia than was currently in use (for example, and
especially, the DSM-II) (Feighner, Robins, Guze, et al., 1972).
The RDC: The "Feighner criteria" were the bases for the Research
and Diagnostic Criteria, or RDC (Feighner, Robins, Guze, et al.,
1972). These criteria returned to Kraepelin's emphasis on
observational data - the RDC has notable clarity and precision
(Neale & Oltmanns, 1980) compared to earlier diagnostic systems.
The RDC meant a smaller and more homogeneous (hence, more
meaningful?) set of patients would be diagnosed as Schizophrenic.
This, in turn, meant diagnoses would be more reliably made
(although this increased reliability did not insure increased
validity).
III. DSM-III
This work had an important influence on the development of the DSM.
The DSM-III moved away from the overly broad definition in the DSM-II to
create a more narrow definition. The DSM-III-R has carried on this
trend toward a narrow conception of Schizophrenia, as illustrated by its
diagnostic criteria.
A. Duration Criterion: To be diagnosed as Schizophrenic, the
individual must have had the symptoms for at least 6 months. This
criterion eliminates brief psychotic episodes and Mood Disorders
such as Major Depression from the diagnostic category of
Schizophrenia. (Why 6 months? 6 months seems to discriminate
between those patients with a good prognosis [less than 6 months]
and those with poor outcomes [more than 6 months] [Andreasen,
1987b]).
B. Characteristic Symptoms: Only those symptoms that are reliably
identifiable are included. Problem: even with a highly reliable
symptom, if it occurs infrequently it may not be useful as a
criterion symptom. The symptoms should be common enough to be
present in enough patients so that the diagnosis can be made
accurately. In addition, the symptoms ideally discriminate between
Schizophrenia and other disorders (ie: symptoms shouldn't also
typically occur in other disorders). There is, however, debate
over the diagnostic significance of DSM-III-R symptoms.
C. Age Criterion: DSM-III required onset prior to age 45. This
criterion has been broadened a bit in the DSM-III-R: onset can
occur after 45, but you must specify it as "late onset". The idea
is that, after 45, we may be dealing with a different disorder,
perhaps symptoms due to natural aging processes.
D. Organic Exclusion Criterion: If there is evidence that the
symptoms are due to an organic (biological) disorder (eg: mental
retardation, drug intoxication) then the diagnosis of Schizophrenia
is not made. This is a confusing criterion, especially with all
the evidence that various organic factors may be the cause of
Schizophrenia.
E. Subtyping: In recognition that there do seem to be distinct
types of Schizophrenia, a number of subtypes have been defined in
the DSM-III-R. There is, however, much debate over the validity of
these subtypes. Typical criticisms: The subtypes don't predict
outcome; they lack validity; reliability is questionable: patients
will present with different subtype symptoms during different
episodes of the disorder; they ignore biological facts. (See your
text, pp. 331-340, for extensive detail regarding these subtypes).
1. Catatonic Type: The essential feature is serious motor
behavior disturbance. Such disturbance can take various
forms: Stupor (marked decrease in responsiveness to
environment, reduction in spontaneous movements, mutism);
Negativism (resistance to all instructions or attempts to be
moved); Rigidity (maintaining a rigid posture against all
efforts to be moved); Excitement (purposeless and excited
activity and movements); Posturing (voluntary assumption of
inappropriate or bizarre postures, often for extended periods
of time).
2. Disorganized Type (previously known as hebephrenia): A
particularly severe (although also less common) type o f
Schizophrenia, characterized by incoherent behaviors,
thoughts,and affect. There is extreme loosening of
associations. The individual seems to become increasingly
indifferent and infantile. Giggling, silliness, weeping,
anger and other reactions inexplicable and inappropriate to
the situation are common. In some cases the incoherence
progresses to the point where the person "makes no sense at
all".
3. Paranoid Type: Characterized by delusions that have themes
of suspiciousness, persecution, or grandeur. For example, the
individual may become extremely suspicious that everyone at
work is trying to kill him, or that he possesses some profound
or even divine powers. Hallucinations will often accompany
these delusions, often reinforcing the false beliefs.
4. Undifferentiated Type: A "waste basket" category, for
those individuals who do not fit neatly into the other
categories, but who do show prominent psychotic symptoms
(delusions, hallucinations, incoherence, grossly disorganized
behavior).
5. Residual Type: A category reserved for those individuals
who have had at least one episode of Schizophrenia, but where
there are no prominent psychotic symptoms. Nevertheless, the
individual still exhibits signs of disorder (eg: marked social
isolation or withdrawal, peculiar behavior, inappropriate
affect, illogical thinking, mild loosening of associations).
6. Alternative Subtyping Schemes: Most investigators would
agree that Schizophrenia is probably made up of a
heterogeneous group of disorders. However, not all would
agree with the way the DSM-III-R has cut up the pie. The DSM-
III-R is just one of many proposed subtyping systems
(Andreasen, 1985; Andreasen, 1987; Carson, et al., 1988; Neale
Oltmanns, 1980):
a) Process vs Reactive
Some cases of Schizophrenia develop slowly and gradually
over a period of time, not in response to any obvious
stressors, and tend to be long-lasting. Other cases seem
to arise quite suddenly, marked by intense emotional
turmoil and confusion. These cases are often associated
with an identifiable stressors; the symptoms usually
fade. These two subtypes have been termed Process
Schizophrenia and Reactive Schizophrenia, respectively.
Alternative terms that are approximately equivalent have
been Poor Premorbid or Chronic Schizophrenia for the
Process type, and Good Premorbid or Acute Schizophrenia
for Reactive Schizophrenia.
b) Paranoid vs Nonparanoid
Schizophrenia has also been subdivided based on the
presence or absence of paranoid symptoms (delusions and
hallucinations of grandeur, persecution, suspiciousness,
etc). Paranoid type: paranoid symptoms are a dominant
feature. Nonparanoid type: paranoid symptoms, if present
at all, tend to be fleeting, rare, and inconsistent.
Paranoid Schizophrenia tends to be more "reactive" than
"process" in type, to have a more benign course and
outcome, and has a less clear genetic link. [There may
be, however, a subgroup of paranoid schizophrenics whose
disorders are quite chronic].
c) Positive vs Negative
Currently, there is much interest in the possible
subtyping of Schizophrenia into positive and negative
types. [To some extent, this approach overlaps the
"process" vs "reactive" approach]. Positive
Schizophrenia: prominent positive symptoms (delusions,
hallucinations, emotional turmoil, motor agitation,
bizarre behavior, and perhaps catatonic features). In
addition, there tends to have been good premorbid
adjustment, a relatively acute onset, and a good
prognosis. Negative Schizophrenia: negative symptoms
(dulled emotions, little movement, impaired or absent
reactivity to the environment). In other words, there is
a deficit or absence of behaviors normally present in a
person's repertoire. In addition, there tends to be poor
premorbid adjustment, suggesting an underlying process
beginning early in life (perhaps biological); onset is
slow and subtle, making it difficult to date the precise
time of onset; and there is a poor prognosis.
IV. Conclusions
There is still debate over how to define Schizophrenia. There is
concern today that the DSM-III-R criteria are too narrow, that "the
pendulum has swung too far" to the narrow side of things (Andreasen,
1987a). Others have even gone further, arguing that the entire concept
of Schizophrenia is a myth. Rather, it is a means of labelling social
undesirables and norm violators and thereby justifying their
incarcerations (eg: Szasz, 1976). The Scottish psychiatrist, R.D. Laing
(1967) has gone so far as to claim that the so-called Schizophrenia
symptoms are in fact highly adaptive responses to an extremely disturbed
environment. Laing argues that, instead of trying to prevent or
interfere with the course of Schizophrenia, we should allow the person
to experience the full course of the disorder. Like a phoenix from the
ashes, the person would eventually arise from his or her psychosis,
reformed and "cured". By "treating" the person, Laing argues, we
actually prevent him or her from growing.
Needless to say, positions such as Szasz and Laing have been
challenged by many investigators. We will have more to say about this
later in the course. However, note that such extreme positions are
important because they force us to confront our assumptions (eg:
Schizophrenia is real, Schizophrenia is bad, Schizophrenia is a problem
with the individual and not his or her environment, etc). As Neale and
Oltmanns in their book on Schizophrenia warn us: Diagnostic systems are
often based more on faith than fact. Instead of blindly accepting the
reality of Schizophrenia (or any disorder for that matter), we must show
that it is a meaningful concept.
In close, a quote:
When we think of schizophrenia, we think of [the destruction
of] the inner unity of the mind and [the weakening of] the
volition and drive that constitute our essential character...
The mind loses the intimate connectedness between thought and
emotion, and the mental life is often resplendent with
distorted perception, false ideas, and lack of clarity or
logic in thought. Aberrant motor and social behaviors are
manifest. The [person's] place in society erodes in an
interactive process reflecting the incapacity to engage and
sustain social bonds and society's reaction to the social and
personal deviancy caused by the [disorder]. This [disorder]
strikes at the very heart of what we consider the essence of
the person. Yet, because its manifestations are so personal
and social, it elicits fear, misunderstanding, and
condemnation in society instead of sympathy and concern.
Schizophrenia remains unparalleled as a stigmatizing
[disorder] with all the societal consequences of personal
shame, family burden, and inadequate support of clinical care,
research, and rehabilitation. It is ironic that in a society
with pride in individual freedom and achievement, the response
to a person whose personal capacity is being eroded...is the
withdrawal of opportunity (Carpenter, 1987, p.3).