Objectives:The ‘Theory of Mind (ToM)’ deficits in schizophrenia have been reported to be related with severity of the psychotic symptoms. However it is not clear whether ToM is likely trait marker or secondary deficits to the symptoms as state marker of schizophrenia. The purpose of this study was to investigate ToM deficits in the schizophrenic patients with mild psychotic symptoms.
Methods:The twenty-two schizophrenic patients and twenty normal subjects were administered ToM story tasks required inferring context-appropriate mental state of the story characters and non-mental physical stories.
Results:The schizophrenic patients with mild psychotic symptom showed selective impairments on the ToM stories, not on the non-mental physical stories.
Conclusion:These findings indicate that the schizophrenic patients with mild psychotic symptoms regarded as almost remitted still have the ToM deficits. Also it is shown ToM ability is not induced by general cognitive dysfunction such as verbal IQ, reading, comprehension, verbal memory and problem solving skills. In this point of view, ToM is considered as kinds of stable trait marker of schizophrenia. (Schizophrenia Clinics 2005;8:17-24) |
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