Poster abstract

Neuropsychology function in schizophrenia

Håkan Nyman

Department of Neuroscience, Division of Psychiatry, Karolinska Institute, Sweden

Neuropsychology is the scientific study of the relationships between brain functions and behavior. In the neuropsychological domain within the HUBIN project data from patients and healthy controls are collected, concerning fundamental psychological functions such as attention, learning and memory, as well as more complex functions such as planning, problem solving and behavior control: executive functions. The first aim of this domain is the collaboration with other projects within HUBIN (genetics, MRI, and others) in order to collect neuropsychological data in patients and controls, which then will be analyzed in relation to genetic, brain morphological and other data from the different projects.

Data are mainly the results from psychological tests.

Patients with schizophrenia are known to exhibit different types of neuropsychological impairments. These impairments has been shown to be more important for functional outcome than symptom type and symptom intensity during the psychotic episodes. The clinical importance thus is well established.

Neuropsychology also contributes to the theoretical understanding of the emergence of psychotic symptoms, within the framework of the vulnerability-stress-model, where neuropsychological impairments are regarded as factors of vulnerability.

The results from patients and controls in standardised neuropsychological tests of attentional, cognitive and executive functions will be presented and relationships with other data domains in the HUBIN data base will be discussed.

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