Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-4rdpn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T04:25:32.875Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The appreciation of imagery by schizophrenics: an interpretation of Goldstein's impairment of the abstract attitude

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2009

J. Cutting*
Affiliation:
King's College Hospital, London
K. Ryan
Affiliation:
King's College Hospital, London
*
1Address for correspondence: Dr J. Cutting, King's College Hospital, Denmark Hill, London SE5.

Synopsis

Three experiments are reported in which schizophrenics are compared with other psychiatric patients on (i) the imagery value of words in their speech, (ii) their memory for words differing in imagery value, and (iii) their ability to distinguish the imagery value of two words. The study was designed to evaluate a neglected interpretation of Goldstein's ideas that schizophrenics are more concrete, in that their ‘action is determined by momentary sense impressions’. The results gave no support for this interpretation and it is suggested that an abnormal way of categorizing the world is more likely to be a useful way of formulating Goldstein's ideas.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1982

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Andreasen, N. (1979). Thought, language and communication disorders. Archives of General Psychiatry 36, 13151330.Google Scholar
Bauman, E. (1971). Schizophrenic short-term memory: a deficit in subjective organization. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science 3, 5565.Google Scholar
Bolles, M. & Goldstein, K. (1938). A study in the impairment of ‘abstract behaviour’ in schizophrenic patients. Psychiatric Quarterly 12, 4265.Google Scholar
Brett, E. A. & Starker, S. (1977). Auditory imagery and hallucinations. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease 164, 394400.Google Scholar
Brown, R. (1973). Schizophrenia, language and reality. American Psychologist 28, 395403.Google Scholar
Collins, A. M. & Quillian, M. R. (1972). How to make a language user. In Organisation of Memory (ed. Tulving, E. and Donaldson, W.), pp. 309351. Academic Press: New York.Google Scholar
Fairbanks, H. (1944). The quantitative differentiation of samples of spoken language. Psychological Monographs 56, 1938.Google Scholar
Giliarovsky, P. (1980). (Quoted by Ostwald P. & Zavarin V. Studies of language and schizophrenia in the USSR.) In Applied Psycholinguistics and Mental Health (ed. Rieber, R. W.). Plenum: New York.Google Scholar
Goldstein, K. (1936). The modifications of behaviour consequent to cerebral lesions. Psychiatric Quarterly 10, 586610.Google Scholar
Goldstein, K. (1939). The significance of special mental tests for diagnosis and prognosis in schizophrenia. American Journal of Psychiatry 99, 575588.Google Scholar
Goldstein, K. & Scheerer, M. (1941). Abstract and concrete behaviour. Psychological Monographs 53. 1151.Google Scholar
Griffiths, J. H., Frith, C. D. & Eysenck, S. B. G. (1980). Psychoticism and thought disorder in psychiatric patients. British Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology 19, 6571.Google Scholar
Johnstone, E. C., Crow, T. J., Frith, C. D., Stevens, M., Kreel, L. & Husband, J. (1978). The dementia of dementia praecox. Acta psychiatrica scandinavica 57, 305324.Google Scholar
Koh, S. D. (1978). Remembering of verbal material by schizophrenic young adults. In Language and Cognition in Schizophrenia (ed. Schwartz, S.), pp. 5599. Lawrence Erlbaum: Hillsdale, N.J.Google Scholar
Mann, M. B. (1944). The quantitative differentiation of samples of written language. Psychological Monographs 56, 4174.Google Scholar
McGaughran, L. S. & Moran, L. J. (1956). Conceptual level vs. conceptual area analyses of object-sorting behaviour of schizophrenic and nonpsychiatric groups. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 52, 4350.Google Scholar
Mintz, S. & Alpert, M. (1972). Imagery vividness, reality testing and schizophrenic hallucinations. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 79, 310316.Google Scholar
Oltmanns, T. F. & Neale, J. M. (1978). Abstraction and schizophrenia. In Progress in Experimental Personality Research, Vol. 8 (ed. Maher, B. A.), pp. 197243. Academic Press: New York.Google Scholar
Paivio, A., Yuille, J. C. & Madigan, S. A. (1968). Concreteness, imagery and meaningfulness values for 925 nouns. Journal of Experimental Psychology, Monograph Supplement 76, 125.Google Scholar
Payne, R. W., Matussek, D. & George, E. I. (1959). An experimental study of schizophrenic thought disorder. Journal of Mental Science 105, 627652.Google Scholar
Rochester, S. & Martin, J. R. (1979). Crazy Talk. Plenum Press: New York.Google Scholar
Rosch, E. (1977). Human categorization. In Studies in Cross-cultural Psychology (ed. Warren, N.), pp. 149. Academic Press: New York.Google Scholar
Shimkunas, A. M. (1972). Conceptual deficit in schizophrenia: a reappraisal. British Journal of Medical Psychology 45, 149157.Google Scholar
Spitzer, R., Endicott, J. & Robins, E. (1975). Research Diagnostic Criteria. Instrument No. 58. New York State Psychiatric Institute: New York.Google Scholar
Thorndike, E. L. & Lorge, I. (1944). The Teachers' Word Book of 30,000 Words. Teachers' College Press: New York.Google Scholar
Traupmann, K. L. (1975). Effects of categorisation and imagey on recognition and recall by process and reactive schizophrenics. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 84, 307314.Google Scholar
White, M. A. (1949). A study of schizophrenic language. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 44, 6174.Google Scholar