COGNITIVE FUNCTION AND BIOLOGICAL CORRELATES OF COGNITIVE PERFORMANCEIN SCHIZOTYPAL PERSONALITY-DISORDER

There is evidence that some schizophrenic patients have deficits on te sts of cognitive function, particularly tests of executive function, i ncluding the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST) and the Trail-making T est, Part B. This study was conducted to determine the generalizabilit y of these findings across the schizophrenia spectrum to schizotypal p ersonality disorder (SPD). Forty DSM-III SPD patients, 56 nonschizophr enia-related other personality disorder (OPD) patients, and 32 normal volunteers from two medical centers performed tests of executive funct ion such as the WCST, Trail-making Part B, Stroop Word-Color Test, and Verbal Fluency, as well as tests of more general intellectual functio ning such as the Wechsler Intelligence Scale-Revised Vocabulary and Bl ock Design subtests, and Trail-making Part A. SPD patients performed m ore poorly on the WCST and on Trail-making Part B than did OPD patient s or normal subjects; the groups did not differ on tests of general in tellectual functioning. SPD patients may share some of the cognitive d eficits observed in schizophrenia.