'Hyper-priming' in thought-disordered schizophrenic patients

Background. A number of studies have suggested that indirect semantic primi ng is enhanced in thought-disordered schizophrenics. However, research on d irect semantic priming has produced conflicting results. The aim of the pre sent study was to resolve some of the ambiguities of previous findings. Methods. For the present study, 44 schizophrenic patients were split accord ing to the presence of associative loosening into a positive thought-disord ered (TD) and non-positive thought-disordered (NTD) group. Thirty healthy s ubjects and 36 psychiatric patients served as controls. Results. Schizophrenics displayed increased indirect semantic priming compa red with psychiatric controls. When subtyping the sample, TD-patients exhib ited significantly enhanced indirect semantic priming compared with healthy and psychiatric controls as well as NTD-patients. Overall slowing was foun d to be independent of priming effects. Medication, age and chronicity of t he schizophrenic illness did not modulate priming. Conclusions. In line with Spitzer and Maher it is inferred that disinhibite d semantic networks underlie formal thought disorder in schizophrenia. For future research, it would be appropriate to. employ indirect semantic primi ng rather than direct semantic priming conditions; and, pay more attention to potential moderators of the priming effect, most importantly, the prime display duration and the length of the stimulus onset asynchrony.