Theory of Mind and Basic Emotion Perception of Male in the Psychotic Trajectory
Poster B34, Friday, October 21, 11:30 am - 1:00 pm, Le Baron
Evangelos Ntouros1, Evangelos Karanikas2, Aikaterini Dardagani1, Aikaterini Tsoura1, George Garyfallos1, Vasilios P. Bozikas1; 1Aristotle University Of Thessaloniki, 2424 Military Hospital of Thessaloniki
Purpose: To investigate the performance of male in Theory of Mind (ToM) and Basic Emotion Perception (BEP) at different stages of the psychosis trajectory compared to healthy controls. Materials and Methods: We recruited 25 male patients with non-affective first episode psychosis (FEP), 12 men diagnosed as ultra high-risk (UHR), 16 male patients with established diagnosis of schizophrenia (CHRON) and 23 healthy male controls (CONTR). We assessed symptom severity in FEP and CHRON patients with the Greek version of the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) and scores were calculated based according to the five-factor model of schizophrenia. For the assessment of ToM and BEP we used the Perception of Social Inference Test (PESIT), which was developed based on The Awareness of Social Inference Test (TASIT). ToM performance was calculated as ToM 1st and ToM 2nd order. Results: BEP: CONTR=UHR>FEP>CHRON, ToM 1st order: CONTR>UHR=FEP=CHRON, ToM 2nd order: CONTR>UHR=FEP=CHRON (> represents statistical significant difference, = represents difference but not statistical significant). Conclusion: i) Deficits in ToM 1st and 2nd order were related to the presence of subthreshold psychotic symptoms indicating a vulnerability to psychosis, whereas ii) Deficits in BEP were associated to the presence of full blown psychotic symptoms indicating further disease progression in the trajectory of psychosis. The latter deficits further deteriorate in the subsequent stages of the disease.
Topic Area: Neurocognition