Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2brh9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T08:07:32.475Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Interaction of Seasonality, Place of Birth, Genetic Risk and Subsequent Schizophrenia in a High Risk Sample

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

Ricardo A. Machón ,
Sarnoff A. Mednick  and
Fini Schulsinger
Ricardo A. Machón
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology and Social Science Research Institute, University of Southern California, DRB 101, University Park-MC 1111, Los Angeles, California 90089–1111 USA
Sarnoff A. Mednick
Affiliation:
Psykologisk Institut, Kommunehospitalet, 1399 Copenhagen Department of Psychology and Social Science Research Institute, University of Southern California, Los Angeles
Fini Schulsinger
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, Kommunehospitalet, 1399 Copenhagen, Denmark
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Summary

Births occurring in winter months, which are high viral infection months, have been repeatedly shown to produce a slight excess of later-diagnosed schizophrenics. As a result, some researchers have speculated on the possible aetiological effect of viral infections on some forms of schizophrenia. The implications of the viral hypothesis were indirectly tested in the context of an ongoing prospective study of Danish children at high-risk (HR) for schizophrenia. A third-order analysis of variance interaction was hypothesized. Genetically vulnerable individuals, born in winter, in an urban environment (which increases the likelihood of the presence and transmission of viruses) would be more likely, as foetuses or neonates, to have suffered some CNS damage due to the infection; thus they would show higher rates of schizophrenia diagnoses. This hypothesis was supported. The rate of schizophrenia in the HR-urban-winter birth condition reached 23.3 per cent, considerably above population base rates (1 per cent) or rates for the HR subjects (8.9 per cent). Alternative explanations for the results were explored.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 143 , Issue 4 , October 1983 , pp. 383 - 388
Copyright
Copyright © 1983 The Royal College of Psychiatrists 

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

Barry, H. & Barry, H. (1961) Season of birth. Archives of General Psychiatry, 5, 292–300.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Campbell, W. A. B. (1953) Influenza in early pregnancy: effects on the foetus. Lancet, 1, 173–4.Google ScholarPubMed
Carter, M. & Watts, C. A. H. (1971) Possible biological advantages among schizophrenics' relatives. British Journal of Psychiatry, 118, 453–60.Google Scholar
Coffey, V. P. & Jessop, W. J. E. (1959) Maternal influenza and congenital deformities: a prospective study. Lancet, 11, 935–8.Google Scholar
Dalén, P. (1968) Month of birth and schizophrenia. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, Suppl. 203, 55–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dalén, P. (1975) Season of Birth: A Study of Schizophrenia and Other Mental Disorders. Amsterdam: North-Holland Publishing Co.Google Scholar
Endicott, J. & Spitzer, R. (1972) Current and past psychopathology scales (CAPPS). Archives of General Psychiatry, 27, 678–87.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hammond, C. S. & Co., Inc. (1949) Hammond's New Liberty World Atlas. New York: C. S. Hammond & Co., Inc.Google Scholar
Hare, E. H. & Price, J. S. (1968) Mental disorder and season of birth: comparison of psychoses with neurosis. British Journal of Psychiatry, 115, 533–40.Google Scholar
Hope-Simpson, R. E. (1981) The role of season in the epidemiology of influenza. Journal of Hygiene, 86, 35–47.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Huntington, E. (1938) Season of Birth. Its Relation to Human Abilities. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
James, W. H. (1978) Seasonality in schizophrenia. Lancet, 1, 664.Google Scholar
Kinney, D. K. & Jacobsen, B. (1978) Environmental factors in schizophrenia: new adoption study evidence. In The Nature of Schizophrenia: New Approaches to Research and Treatment (eds. Wynne, L. C., Cromwell, R. L. and Matthysse, S.). New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.Google Scholar
Lewis, M. S. & Griffin, P. A. (1981) An explanation of the season of birth effect in schizophrenia and certain other diseases. Psychological Bulletin, 89, 589–96.Google Scholar
McNeil, T. F. & Kaij, L. (1978) Obstetric factors in the development of schizophrenia: complications in the births of preschizophrenics and in reproduction by schizophrenic parents. In The Nature of Schizophrenia: New Approaches to Research and Treatment (eds. Wynne, L. C., Cromwell, R. L. and Matthysse, S.). New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.Google Scholar
Mednick, S. A. (1970) Breakdown in individuals at high risk for schizophrenia: possible predispositional perinatal factors. Mental Hygiene, 54, 50–63.Google Scholar
Mednick, S. A. & Schulsinger, F. (1968) Some premorbid characteristics related to breakdown in children with schizophrenic mothers. In The Transmission of Schizophrenia (eds. Rosenthal, D. and Kety, S.). London: Pergamon Press.Google Scholar
Mother's Aid Organization for Copenhagen, Copenhagen County, and Frederiksborg County. Annual Report for 1946–47. Copenhagen, Denmark.Google Scholar
Ødegaard, O. (1974) Season of birth in the general population and in patients with mental disorder in Norway. British Journal of Psychiatry, 125, 397–405.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parker, G. & Balza, B. (1977) Season of birth and schizophrenia: an equatorial study. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 56, 143–6.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Parker, G. & Neilson, M. (1976) Mental disorder and season of birth: a southern hemisphere study. British Journal of Psychiatry, 129, 355–61.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rieder, R. O., Rosenthal, D., Wender, P. & Blumenthal, H. (1975) The offspring of schizophrenics. Archives of General Psychiatry, 32, 200–11.Google Scholar
SAS Institute Inc. (1979) SAS User's Guide, 1979 Edition. Cary, North Carolina: SAS Institute Inc.Google Scholar
Saxén, L., Hjelt, L., Sjostedt, J. E., Hakosalo, J. & Hakosalo, H. (1960) Asian influenza during pregnancy and congenital malformations. Acta Pathologica et Microbiologica Scandinavica, 49, 114–26.Google Scholar
Schulsinger, H. (1976) A ten-year follow-up of children of schizophrenic mothers: clinical assessment. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 53, 371–86.Google Scholar
Sobel, D. E. (1961) Infant mortality and malformations in children of schizophrenic women. Psychiatric Quarterly, 35, 60–5.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Torrey, E. F. (1980) Schizophrenia and Civilization. New York: Jason Aronson, Inc.Google Scholar
Torrey, E. F. & Peterson, M. R. (1976) The viral hypothesis of schizophrenia. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 2, 136–46.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Videbech, Th., Weeke, A. & Dupont, A. (1974) Endogenous psychoses and season of birth. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 50, 202–18.Google Scholar
Watson, C. G., Kucala, T., Angulski, G. & Brunn, C. (1982) Season of birth and schizophrenia: a response to the Lewis and Griffin critique. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 91, 120–5.Google Scholar
Wing, J. K., Cooper, J. E. & Sartorius, N. (1974) The Measurement and Classification of Psychiatric Symptoms. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.