Schizotypy

In psychology, schizotypy is a theoretical concept that posits a continuum of personality characteristics and experiences, ranging from normal dissociative, imaginative states to extreme states of mind related to psychosis, especially schizophrenia. The continuum of personality proposed in schizotypy is in contrast to a categorical view of psychosis, wherein psychosis is considered a particular (usually pathological) state of mind, which the person either has or does not have. In psychology, schizotypy is a theoretical concept that posits a continuum of personality characteristics and experiences, ranging from normal dissociative, imaginative states to extreme states of mind related to psychosis, especially schizophrenia. The continuum of personality proposed in schizotypy is in contrast to a categorical view of psychosis, wherein psychosis is considered a particular (usually pathological) state of mind, which the person either has or does not have. The categorical view of psychosis is most associated with Emil Kraepelin, who created criteria for the medical diagnosis and classification of different forms of psychotic illness. Particularly, he made the distinction between dementia praecox (now called schizophrenia), manic depressive insanity and non-psychotic states. Modern diagnostic systems used in psychiatry (such as the DSM) maintain this categorical view. In contrast, psychiatrist Eugen Bleuler did not believe there was a clear separation between sanity and madness, believing instead that psychosis was simply an extreme expression of thoughts and behaviours that could be present to varying degrees throughout the population. The concept of psychosis as a spectrum was further developed by psychologists such as Hans Eysenck and Gordon Claridge, who sought to understand unusual variations in thought and behaviour in terms of personality theory. Eysenck conceptualised cognitive and behavioral variations as all together forming a single personality trait, psychoticism. Claridge named his concept schizotypy, and through examination of unusual experiences in the general population and clustering of symptoms in individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia, the work of Claridge suggested that this personality trait was more complex than had been previously thought and could be broken down into four factors. Although aiming to reflect some of the features present in diagnosable mental illness, schizotypy does not necessarily imply that someone who is more schizotypal than someone else is more ill. For example, certain aspects of schizotypy may be beneficial. Both the unusual experiences and cognitive disorganisation aspects have been linked to creativity and artistic achievement. Jackson proposed the concept of ‘benign schizotypy’ in relation to certain classes of religious experience, which he suggested might be regarded as a form of problem-solving and therefore of adaptive value. The link between positive schizotypy and certain facets of creativity is consistent with the notion of a 'healthy schizotypy', which may account for the persistence of schizophrenia-related genes in the population despite their many dysfunctional aspects. However, the exact nature of the relationship between schizotypy and diagnosable psychotic illness is still controversial. One of the key concerns that researchers have had is that questionnaire-based measures of schizotypy, when analysed using factor analysis, do not suggest that schizotypy is a unified, homogeneous concept. The three main approaches have been labelled as 'quasi-dimensional', ‘dimensional’ and ‘fully dimensional’. Each approach is sometimes used to imply that schizotypy reflects a cognitive or biological vulnerability to psychosis, although this may remain dormant and never express itself, unless triggered by appropriate environmental events or conditions (such as certain doses of drugs or high levels of stress). The quasi-dimensional model may be traced back to Bleuler (the inventor of the term ‘schizophrenia’), who commented on two types of continuity between normality and psychosis: that between the schizophrenic and his or her relatives, and that between the patient’s premorbid and post-morbid personalities (i.e. their personality before and after the onset of overt psychosis).