MEMORY AND VIGILANCE TRAINING TO IMPROVE SOCIAL-PERCEPTION IN SCHIZOPHRENIA

Previous research has suggested that social cue recognition in schizop hrenia may be significantly associated with visual vigilance and verba l memory. Therefore, we predicted that subjects who participated in a cognitive rehabilitation program that incorporated vigilance and memor y training strategies would show significantly better social cue recog nition than subjects participating in vigilance training alone. Forty subjects with a DSM-III-R diagnosis of schizophrenia or schizoaffectiv e disorder were randomly assigned to either a vigilance-alone or a vig ilance-plus-memory training condition. Results showed that subjects in the vigilance-plus-memory condition were able to identify social cues in the videotaped training materials significantly better than subjec ts in the vigilance-alone condition. This difference was evident in an independent measure of social cue recognition and was present at a 48 h follow-up. Implications for future development of cognitive rehabil itation for schizophrenia were discussed.