Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gvvz8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-22T16:21:15.408Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Proverbs Test in Schizophrenia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

J. L. Reed
J. L. Reed*
Affiliation:
Maudsley Hospital, Denmark Hill, London, S.E.5; Dept. of Psychiatry, St. Bartholomew's Hospital, London, E.C.I
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The ability to interpret the meaning of metaphorical proverbs has been used not only in intelligence testing but also to investigate abnormalities of thinking in schizophrenia; mainly the theories that schizophrenics are either “concrete” or “overinclusive” in their thinking. The theory of concreteness has been proposed mainly by Goldstein (1946), who held that schizophrenics were unable to adopt the “abstract attitude”, and, having lost the ability to form normal abstract concepts, formed concrete ones instead. Cameron (1946) described overinclusion as one of several abnormalities found in schizophrenic thinking. This abnormality has been adopted by Payne and his co-workers (1957, 1959, 1960, 1962, and 1966) as the basic disorder of schizophrenic thinking. Schizophrenics showing this disorder appear unable to maintain the boundaries of a problem, and so form overbroad concepts. Overinclusion, however, is found in only about 50 per cent. of acute schizophrenics and has also reported in other psychiatric conditions (Payne and Hirst, 1957; Payne and Frielander, 1962; Sturm, 1965).

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 114 , Issue 508 , March 1968 , pp. 317 - 321
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1968 

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

Benjamin, J. D. (1946). “A method of distinguishing and evaluating formal thinking disorder.” In: Language and Thought in Schizophrenia (ed. Kasanin, J. S.). Berkeley and Los Angeles: Univ. of California Press.Google Scholar
Brattemo, C. E. (1961). “Interpretation of proverbs in schizophrenic and depressed patients.” Acta psychiat. Scand., 37, 193–197.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cameron, J. (1946). “Experimental analysis of schizophrenic thinking.” In: Language and Thought in Schizophrenia (ed. Kasanin, J. S.). Berkeley and Los Angeles: Univ. of California Press.Google Scholar
Goldstein, K. (1946). “Methodological approach to the study of schizophrenic thought disorder.” In: Language and Thought in Schizophrenia (ed. Kasanin, J. S.). Berkeley and Los Angeles: Univ. of California Press.Google Scholar
Gorham, D. R. (1956a). “A proverbs test for clinical and experimental use.” Psychol. Repts., 2, 1–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gorham, D. R. (1956b). “The use of the proverbs test in differentiating schizophrenics from normals.” J. consult. Psychol., 20, 435–440.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hadlich, H. (1931). “Schizophrene Denkstörung.” Psychol. Forsch., 15, 359–373.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hanfmann, E., and Kasanin, J. (1942). Conceptual Thinking in Schizophrenia. N.Y. Nervous and Mental Disease Monographs.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hunt, W. A., and Jones, N. F. (1958). “Clinical judgement of some aspects of schizophrenic thinking.” J. clin. Psychol., 14, 235–239.3.0.CO;2-B>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lehman, E. (1960). “The monster test.” Arch. gen. Psychiat., 3, 535–544.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Payne, R. W. (1960). “Cognitive abnormalities.” In: Handbook of Abnormal Psychology (ed. Eysenck, H. J.). London: Pitman.Google Scholar
Payne, R. W. (1962). “An object classification test as a measure of overinclusive thinking in schizophrenic patients.” Brit. J. soc. clin. Psychol., 1, 213–221.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Payne, R. W. (1966). “The measurement and significance of overinclusive thinking and retardation in schizophrenic patients.” In: Psychopathology of Schizophrenia (ed. Hoch, P. H., and Zubin, J.). New York: Grune and Stratton.Google Scholar
Payne, R. W. and Friedlander, D. (1962). “A short battery of simple tests for measuring overinclusive thinking.” J. ment. Sci., 108, 362–367.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Payne, R. W. and Hewlett, J. H. G. (1960). “Thought disorder in psychotic patients.” In: Experiments in Personality (ed. Eysenck, H. J.). Vol. II. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Payne, R. W. and Hirst, Heather L. (1957). “Overinclusive thinking in a depressive and a control group.” J. consult. Psychol., 21, 186–188.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Payne, R. W. Matussek, P., and George, E. I. (1959). “Experimental study of schizophrenic thought disorder.” J. ment. Sci., 105, 627–652.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sturm, I. E. (1965). “Overinclusion and concreteness among pathological groups.” J. consult. Psychol., 29, 9–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wegrocki, H. J. (1940). “Generalizing ability in schizophrenia.” Arch. Psychol. N.Y., 36, No. 254.Google Scholar
Yates, A. J. (1956). “The use of vocabulary in the measurement of intellectual deterioration.” J. ment. Sci., 102, 409–440.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zeigarnik, B. V. (1934). “On grasping of figurative meanings of words or sentences in pathological changes in thinking.” In: Recent Advances in Aphasia, Agnosia and Apraxia, p. 70–84. (Published in Russian and quoted in Hanfmann and Kasanin, 1942.)Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.