Assessment of Mental Imagery of Movement in Schizophrenia

Special Article: Mental Illness

Austin Addict Sci. 2023; 5(1): 1016.

Assessment of Mental Imagery of Movement in Schizophrenia

Theofilidis Antonis1,4*; Savvidis George2; Sofologi Maria3; Hanopoulou Margarita3; Tsagaridis Konstantinos3; Karakatsoulis Grigoris8; Fountoulakis Konstantinos6; Nimatoudis Ioannis5; Papaxanthis Charalampos7

11Academic Scholarship of the Department of Obstetrics, University of Western Macedonia, Greece

22PhD candidate, Department of Obstetrics, University of Western Macedonia, Greece

33Cognitive Psychologist, Neuropsychologist of C’ Department Psychiatric Clinic of AHEPA Hospital Thessaloniki, Greece

44PhD Cognitive Psychology, Neuropsychologist of C’ Department Psychiatric Clinic of AHEPA Hospital Thessaloniki, Greece

55Professor, of C’ Department Psychiatric Clinic of AHEPA Hospital Thessaloniki, Greece

66Professor, Director of C’ Department Psychiatric Clinic of AHEPA Hospital Thessaloniki, Greece

77Professor, Directeur du laboratoire CAPS (Cognition, Action, et Plasticité Sensorimotrice), Université de Bourgogne, Dijon, France

8Psychiatrist Consultant, 3rd Psychiatry Department of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, University General Hospital of Thessaloniki, AHEPA, Greece

*Corresponding author: Theofilidis Antonis Clinical Neuropsychologist, PhD Cognitive Psychology, Neuropsychologist of C’ Department Psychiatric Clinic of AHEPA Hospital Thessaloniki, Greece. Tel: +306978802810 Email: antonis109@yahoo.gr

Received: April 03, 2023 Accepted: May 02, 2023 Published: May 09, 2023

Abstract

Schizophrenia patients often present with neurological signs such as left/right confusion, impaired coordination of movements, and motor abnormalities may occur secondary to antipsychotic medications. Neuropsychological tests identify various dysfunctions, such as difficulty in focusing attention, difficulty in abstract thinking or difficulty in changing the response frame, while Neurophysiological tests show slowing down of reaction time, problems with eye tracking, etc. There are no studies in the international literature dealing with the investigation of mental imagery of movement in Greek patients with schizophrenia. Also, the position that patients with schizophrenia – regardless of their symptom profile, age, sex, and chronicity of the disease – have a permanent difficulty in creating and manipulating an internal model of their movement prediction has not been substantiated enough to date.

Aim: In the present study we examine the function of visual-motor coordination and the time to achieve the goal-directed movement of the dominant hand of patients with schizophrenia

Method: The sample we used in our research consisted of patients with diagnosed schizophrenia and healthy individuals. Schizophrenia patients belonged to the experimental group and healthy subjects to the control group. The number of examined patients was 39 and the healthy 51. The assessment of the movement and its mental representation was carried out with the real and mental movement of the dominant hand between two square targets located at a distance of 20cm, on white paper of A4 size.

Conclusions: Visuomotor coordination of a specific hand movement differs between patients with schizophrenia and the normal population. In particular, the means of the goal-directed hand movement achievement time in the actual execution condition and in the mental execution condition of the patients were significantly higher than the corresponding times of the standard population.

Keywords: Schizophrenia; Mental imagery of movement

Introduction

Neuropsychological deficits are recognized as primary symptoms of psychotic disorders, since they are detected even in the early stages, with some of them showing a more significant decline (e.g. executive functions, memory, attention) and others a smaller but significant one (e.g. language , movement perception, psychomotor). A wealth of neuropsychological research over the past decade has contributed to elucidating the nature and significance of cognitive dysfunction in schizophrenia. Today we know that patients with schizophrenia show lower performance in all known neuropsychological tests compared to healthy controls.

Schizophrenic Deficits in Psychomotor Speed

We know that schizophrenia is governed by deficits in psychomotor speed [8.29]. Psychomotor speed refers to the time to process a stimulus, prepare the response to that stimulus, and execute the response [8]. It has been shown that patients with schizophrenia are disadvantaged compared to healthy individuals in tests of psychomotor speed [8,24,29]. However, this difference does not always reach the significance level [3]. Of interest is the result of the research by Riley and his colleagues (2000) that deficits in psychomotor speed in schizophrenia appear as early as the first episode, reinforcing the view that this area is greatly damaged by the presence of psychotic symptoms [34]. Sweeney et al.'s (1991) study found improvement in psychomotor speed in both first-episode schizophrenia patients and patients with a previous history of psychosis [28], which is consistent with the view that neurocognitive deficits in patients with schizophrenia remain relatively stable across the lifespan [8,34].

Citation:Antonis T, George S, Maria S, Margarita H, Konstantinos T. Assessment of Mental Imagery of Movement in Schizophrenia. Austin Addict Sci. 2023; 5(1): 1016.