Automatic processing of verbal emotion stimuli in schizophrenia

Abstract 

In the present study, automatic processing of verbal emotion stimuli was investigated as a function of affective symptoms, emotional state and trait characteristics of chronic schizophrenia patients. A sequential pronunciation priming task was administered to 30 schizophrenia patients with a flat affect expression, 30 schizophrenia patients suffering from anhedonia, 28 schizophrenia patients not suffering from anhedonia or flat affect, and 30 healthy subjects to assess affective and semantic priming effects. The Scale for the Assessment of Negative Symptoms (Andreasen, British Journal of Psychiatry, 1989, 155, 53–58) was applied to evaluate the flat affect and anhedonia, and to categorize patients into groups. Schizophrenia patients did not differ from healthy subjects in affective and semantic priming scores. However, affective priming based on positive primes was inversely correlated with negative state and trait affectivity, and positively correlated with trait joy in the patient sample. These results support the view that a decrement in automatic processing facilitation of positive valence might play a role in the development of negative emotions. The symptoms of flat affect and anhedonia do not appear to be associated with impairments in the automatic processing of verbal emotional material in schizophrenia.

Keywords:  Affective priming, Pronunciation task, Negative symptoms, Flat affect, Anhedonia