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Psychiatry Research Jan 2018Recent evidence suggests that sleep problems are associated with psychotic like experiences including paranoia. However, the mechanisms underpinning this association are...
Recent evidence suggests that sleep problems are associated with psychotic like experiences including paranoia. However, the mechanisms underpinning this association are not well understood and thus studies modelling hypothesised mediating factors are required. Alexithymia, the inability to recognise and describe emotions within the self may be an important candidate. In two separate studies we sought to investigate factors mediating the relationship between sleep quality and paranoia using a cross-sectional design. Healthy volunteers without a mental health diagnosis were recruited (study 1, N = 401, study 2, N = 402). Participants completed a series of measures assessing paranoia, negative emotions, alexithymia and perceptual anomalies in an online survey. In study 1, regression and mediation analyses showed that the relationship between sleep quality and paranoia was partially mediated by alexithymia, perceptual anomalies and negative affect. In contrast, study 2 found that the relationship between sleep quality and paranoia was fully mediated by negative affect, alexithymia and perceptual anomalies. The link between sleep quality and paranoia is unclear and reasons for discrepant results are discussed. Novel findings in this study include the link between alexithymia and paranoia.
Topics: Adolescent; Adult; Affective Symptoms; Aged; Cross-Sectional Studies; Emotions; Female; Healthy Volunteers; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Paranoid Disorders; Perceptual Disorders; Regression Analysis; Sleep; Sleep Wake Disorders; Surveys and Questionnaires; Young Adult
PubMed: 29080493
DOI: 10.1016/j.psychres.2017.09.066 -
Neuropsychologia Nov 2023We present a comprehensive review of the rare syndrome visual form agnosia (VFA). We begin by documenting its history, including the origins of the term, and the first... (Review)
Review
We present a comprehensive review of the rare syndrome visual form agnosia (VFA). We begin by documenting its history, including the origins of the term, and the first case study labelled as VFA. The defining characteristics of the syndrome, as others have previously defined it, are then described. The impairments, preserved aspects of visual perception, and areas of brain damage in 21 patients who meet these defining characteristics are described in detail, including which tests were used to verify the presence or absence of key symptoms. From this, we note important similarities along with notable areas of divergence between patients. Damage to the occipital lobe (20/21), an inability to recognise line drawings (19/21), preserved colour vision (14/21), and visual field defects (16/21) were areas of consistency across most cases. We found it useful to distinguish between shape and form as distinct constructs when examining perceptual abilities in VFA patients. Our observations suggest that these patients often exhibit difficulties in processing simplified versions of form. Deficits in processing orientation and size were uncommon. Motion perception and visual imagery were not widely tested for despite being typically cited as defining features of the syndrome - although in the sample described, motion perception was never found to be a deficit. Moreover, problems with vision (e.g., poor visual acuity and the presence of hemianopias/scotomas in the visual fields) are more common than we would have thought and may also contribute to perceptual impairments in patients with VFA. We conclude that VFA is a perceptual disorder where the visual system has a reduced ability to synthesise lines together for the purposes of making sense of what images represent holistically.
Topics: Humans; Pattern Recognition, Visual; Visual Perception; Vision, Ocular; Visual Fields; Vision Disorders; Agnosia
PubMed: 37634886
DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2023.108666 -
Scientific Reports Dec 2017Are synaesthetic experiences congenital and so hard-wired, or can a functional analogue be created? We induced an equivalent of form-colour synaesthesia using hypnotic...
Are synaesthetic experiences congenital and so hard-wired, or can a functional analogue be created? We induced an equivalent of form-colour synaesthesia using hypnotic suggestions in which symbols in an array (circles, crosses, squares) were suggested always to have a certain colour. In a Stroop type-naming task, three of the four highly hypnotizable participants showed a strong synaesthesia-type association between symbol and colour. This was verified both by their subjective reports and objective eye-movement behaviour. Two resembled a projector- and one an associator-type synaesthete. Participant interviews revealed that subjective experiences differed somewhat from typical (congenital) synaesthesia. Control participants who mimicked the task using cognitive strategies showed a very different response pattern. Overall, the results show that the targeted, preconsciously triggered associations and perceptual changes seen in association with congenital synaesthesia can rapidly be induced by hypnosis. They suggest that each participant's subjective experience of the task should be carefully evaluated, especially when studying hypnotic hallucinations. Studying such experiences can increase understanding of perception, automaticity, and awareness and open unique opportunities in cognitive neuroscience and consciousness research.
Topics: Adult; Attention; Color Perception; Female; Humans; Hypnosis; Male; Pattern Recognition, Visual; Perceptual Disorders; Reaction Time; Synesthesia
PubMed: 29229939
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-16174-y -
NeuroImage Apr 2019The 22q11.2 deletion is one of the most common copy number variants in humans. Carriers of the deletion have a markedly increased risk for neurodevelopmental brain... (Review)
Review
The 22q11.2 deletion is one of the most common copy number variants in humans. Carriers of the deletion have a markedly increased risk for neurodevelopmental brain disorders, including schizophrenia, autism spectrum disorders, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. The high risk of psychiatric disorders associated with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome offers a unique possibility to identify the functional abnormalities that precede the emergence of psychosis. Carriers of a 22q11.2 deletion show a broad range of sensory processing and cognitive abnormalities similar as in schizophrenia, such as auditory and visual sensory processing, response inhibition, working memory, social cognition, reward processing and arithmetic processing. All these processes have a significant negative impact on daily life if impaired and have been studied extensively in schizophrenia using task-based functional neuroimaging. Here, we review task-related functional brain mapping studies that have used electroencephalography or functional magnetic resonance imaging to identify functional alterations in carriers with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome within the above mentioned cognitive and sensory domains. We discuss how the identification of functional changes at the brain system level can advance the general understanding of which neurobiological alterations set the frame for the emergence of neurodevelopmental disorders in the human brain. The task-based functional neuroimaging literature shows conflicting results in many domains. Nevertheless, consistent similarities between 22q11.2 deletion syndrome and schizophrenia have been found for sensory processing, social cognition and working memory. We discuss these functional brain alterations in terms of potential biomarkers of increased risk for psychosis in the general population.
Topics: Brain; Cognitive Dysfunction; DiGeorge Syndrome; Disease Susceptibility; Evoked Potentials; Functional Neuroimaging; Humans; Perceptual Disorders; Schizophrenia
PubMed: 30195053
DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2018.09.001 -
Tijdschrift Voor Psychiatrie 2016The Alice in Wonderland syndrome (AIWS) was conceptualised in 1955 as a group of distortions of visual perception, the body schema and the experience of time. Although... (Review)
Review
BACKGROUND
The Alice in Wonderland syndrome (AIWS) was conceptualised in 1955 as a group of distortions of visual perception, the body schema and the experience of time. Although 60 years have passed since then, very little is known yet about the syndrome. This is surprising since the AIWS has important diagnostic and therapeutic implications.
AIM
To provide an overview of the literature on the AIWS.
METHOD
For this review, a literature search was carried out in PubMed and the historical literature.
RESULTS
The search yielded 70 papers with a total of 169 case descriptions. As these papers indicate, the AIWS has many causes, the main ones being neurological, infectious and substance-related; sometimes the causes are psychiatric. Among adults and elderly patients the disorders described are mainly neurological; among young people encephalitis is fairly common. Treatment needs to be directed at the (assumed) underlying condition, although in almost half of the cases the patient's main requirement is reassurance rather than treatment. Prevalence rates are unknown, but studies in the general population indicate that the symptoms of the AIWS occur more frequently than previously assumed.
CONCLUSION
Clinical suspicion of an AIWS warrants careful auxiliary investigations and - whenever necessary - treatment. The AIWS should not be confused with schizophrenia spectrum disorders and other perceptual disorders, and it deserves to be included in the research agenda of international classifications such as the DSM and ICD.
Topics: Alice in Wonderland Syndrome; Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders; Hallucinations; Humans; Illusions
PubMed: 27075220
DOI: No ID Found -
European Archives of Psychiatry and... Apr 2020Reports of limited clinical significance of attenuated psychotic symptoms before age 15/16 indicate an important role of neurodevelopment in the early detection of...
Reports of limited clinical significance of attenuated psychotic symptoms before age 15/16 indicate an important role of neurodevelopment in the early detection of psychoses. Therefore, we examined if age also exerts an influence on the prevalence and clinical significance of the 14 cognitive and perceptive basic symptoms (BS) used in psychosis-risk criteria and conceptualized as the most direct self-experienced expression of neurobiological aberrations. A random representative general population sample of the Swiss canton Bern (N = 689, age 8-40 years, 06/2011-05/2014) was interviewed for BS, psychosocial functioning, and current mental disorder. BS were reported by 18% of participants, mainly cognitive BS (15%). In regression analyses, age affected perceptive and cognitive BS differently, indicating an age threshold for perceptive BS in late adolescence (around age 18) and for cognitive BS in young adulthood (early twenties)-with higher prevalence, but a lesser association with functional deficits and the presence of mental disorder in the below-threshold groups. Thereby, interaction effects between age and BS on functioning and mental disorder were commonly stronger than individual effects of age and BS. Indicating support of the proposed "substrate-closeness" of BS, differential age effects of perceptual and cognitive BS seem to follow normal brain maturation processes, in which they might occur as infrequent and temporary non-pathological disturbances. Their persistence or occurrence after conclusion of main brain maturation processes, however, might signify aberrant maturation or neurodegenerative processes. Thus, BS might provide important insight into the pathogenesis of psychosis and into differential neuroprotective or anti-inflammatory targets.
Topics: Adolescent; Adult; Age Factors; Brain; Child; Cognitive Dysfunction; Female; Human Development; Humans; Male; Perceptual Disorders; Prevalence; Psychotic Disorders; Risk; Switzerland; Young Adult
PubMed: 30361925
DOI: 10.1007/s00406-018-0949-4 -
Brazilian Journal of Otorhinolaryngology 2019Central auditory processing screening in schoolchildren has led to debates in literature, both regarding the protocol to be used and the importance of actions aimed at...
INTRODUCTION
Central auditory processing screening in schoolchildren has led to debates in literature, both regarding the protocol to be used and the importance of actions aimed at prevention and promotion of auditory health. Defining effective screening procedures for central auditory processing is a challenge in Audiology.
OBJECTIVE
This study aimed to analyze the scientific research on central auditory processing screening and discuss the effectiveness of the procedures utilized.
METHODS
A search was performed in the SciELO and PUBMed databases by two researchers. The descriptors used in Portuguese and English were: auditory processing, screening, hearing, auditory perception, children, auditory tests and their respective terms in Portuguese.
INCLUSION CRITERIA
original articles involving schoolchildren, auditory screening of central auditory skills and articles in Portuguese or English.
EXCLUSION CRITERIA
studies with adult and/or neonatal populations, peripheral auditory screening only, and duplicate articles. After applying the described criteria, 11 articles were included.
RESULTS
At the international level, central auditory processing screening methods used were: screening test for auditory processing disorder and its revised version, screening test for auditory processing, scale of auditory behaviors, children's auditory performance scale and Feather Squadron. In the Brazilian scenario, the procedures used were the simplified auditory processing assessment and Zaidan's battery of tests.
CONCLUSION
At the international level, the screening test for auditory processing and Feather Squadron batteries stand out as the most comprehensive evaluation of hearing skills. At the national level, there is a paucity of studies that use methods evaluating more than four skills, and are normalized by age group. The use of simplified auditory processing assessment and questionnaires can be complementary in the search for an easy access and low-cost alternative in the auditory screening of Brazilian schoolchildren. Interactive tools should be proposed, that allow the selection of as many hearing skills as possible, validated by comparison with the battery of tests used in the diagnosis.
Topics: Auditory Perceptual Disorders; Child; Hearing Tests; Humans; Mass Screening; School Health Services
PubMed: 29615299
DOI: 10.1016/j.bjorl.2018.02.004 -
Revista de Neurologia Feb 2017Face perception involves a broad network of connections between cortical and subcortical regions for the exchange and synchronization of information using white matter... (Review)
Review
INTRODUCTION
Face perception involves a broad network of connections between cortical and subcortical regions for the exchange and synchronization of information using white matter fibers. This precise communication system can be affected by the structures and the pathways that connect them.
AIMS
To establish the neural substrate underlying the perception of facial expression and to analyze the different factors involved in modulating the integrity of this neural network, with the aim being to introduce improvements into rehabilitation programs.
DEVELOPMENT
When the complex neural network involved in the perception of facial expression is altered by trauma, neurodegenerative disorders, developmental disorders, social isolation or negative contexts, the adaptive capacity to interact with the environment also deteriorates.
CONCLUSIONS
Maintaining the neural network integrity responsible for processing facial expression requires considering different variables. To a greater or lesser extent, these variables modify the structure or function of neural networks, such as aerobic training, transcranial magnetic stimulation, transcranial electrical stimulation, and learning. These variables are affected by age, and the type and course of the condition or generator context, and raise the need for rehabilitation protocols that are adapted and designed to delimit the deficient neuronal substrate.
Topics: Connectome; Facial Expression; Gray Matter; Humans; Mental Disorders; Nerve Net; Pattern Recognition, Visual; Perceptual Disorders; Visual Pathways; Visual Perception; White Matter
PubMed: 28128430
DOI: No ID Found -
Cortex; a Journal Devoted To the Study... Jul 2024Spatial neglect is a common and debilitating disorder after stroke whereby individuals have difficulty reporting, orienting, and/or responding to the contralesional side... (Review)
Review
Spatial neglect is a common and debilitating disorder after stroke whereby individuals have difficulty reporting, orienting, and/or responding to the contralesional side of space. Given the heterogeneity of neglect symptom presentation, various neglect subtypes have been proposed to better characterize the disorder. This review focuses on the distinction between Input neglect (i.e., difficulty perceiving and/or attending to contralesional stimuli) and Output neglect (i.e., difficulty planning and/or executing movements toward contralesional stimuli). Conceptualizations of Input and Output neglect have varied considerably. We provide a novel summary of the terminology, measurement approaches, and neural correlates of these subtypes. A protocol detailing our systematic scoping review strategy is registered on the Open Science Framework (https://osf.io/bvtxf/). For feasibility and greater comparability across studies, we limited our inclusion criteria to tasks focused on visual stimuli and upper-limb movements. A total of 110 articles were included in the review. Subtyping tasks were categorized based on whether they mainly manipulated aspects of the input (i.e., congruence of visual input with motor output, presence of visual input) or the output (i.e., modality, goal, or direction of output) to produce an Input-Output subtype dissociation. We used our review results to identify four main critiques of this literature: 1) lack of consistency/clarity in conceptual models; 2) methodological issues of dissociating Input and Output subtypes; 3) a need for updated neural theories; and 4) barriers to clinical application. We discuss the lessons learned from this subtyping dimension that can be applied to future research on neglect subtype assessment and treatment.
Topics: Humans; Perceptual Disorders; Space Perception; Stroke; Functional Laterality; Visual Perception; Psychomotor Performance
PubMed: 38729033
DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2024.04.005 -
The Journal of Pain Nov 2021The Bath Complex Regional Pain Syndrome Body Perception Disturbance Scale ("B-CRPS-BPDS") measures alterations in body perception. We assessed its internal consistency,...
The Bath Complex Regional Pain Syndrome Body Perception Disturbance Scale ("B-CRPS-BPDS") measures alterations in body perception. We assessed its internal consistency, known group validity, construct validity, and associations with demographic and clinical characteristics. We also evaluated changes in, and baseline predictors of B-CRPS-BPDS scores at follow-up. We included people with CRPS (N = 114) and pain-free controls (N = 69). People with CRPS obtained higher scores than pain-free controls on all B-CRPS-BPDS items, except the item on attention. Because this item also had an insufficient corrected item-total correlation, we propose a revised B-CRPS-BPDS (r-B-CRPS-BPDS) excluding this item. The internal consistency of the r-B-CRPS-BPDS was good. The r-B-CRPS-BPDS showed a large positive relationship with "motor neglect-like symptoms", indicating good construct validity. The r-B-CRPS-BPDS showed positive relationships with pain intensity, fear of movement, depression, and upper limb disability. There were no independent relationships with handedness, affected side, affected limb, disease duration, CRPS severity score, tension, anger, fatigue, confusion, and vigour. Finally, r-B-CRPS-BPDS scores did not consistently change over time. Our results demonstrate the utility of the r-B-CRPS-BPDS for measuring body perception disturbances in CRPS. PERSPECTIVE: This article evaluates the validity of the Bath Complex Regional Pain Syndrome Body Perception Disturbance Scale ("B-CRPS-BPDS") in CRPS, and assesses relationships with demographic and clinical variables. The proposed revised B-CRPS-BPDS appears to be a valid measure of body perception disturbances in CRPS.
Topics: Adult; Aged; Body Image; Chronic Pain; Complex Regional Pain Syndromes; Female; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Neuropsychological Tests; Pain Measurement; Perceptual Disorders; Psychometrics; Reproducibility of Results
PubMed: 33964412
DOI: 10.1016/j.jpain.2021.04.007