The comparison of cognitive functions in schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder

Abstract

Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate cognitive function in individuals with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder. Method: Research participants included 48 outpatients with a diagnosis of schizophrenia, 35 outpatients with schizoaffective disorder, and 48 non-patients from the community. Scale for Assessment of Positive Symptoms (SAPS), Scale for Assessment of Negative Symptoms (SANS), and Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS) were applied to the patients. Neuropsychological evaluation included Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST) for executive functions, Verbal Memory Processes Test (VMPT) for verbal memory and Stroop Test (ST) for attention tasks. Results: There were significant differences among the groups in the number of categories completed, number of perseverative error, percentage of perseverative error, number of conceptual level responses and percentage of conceptual level responses in WCST; time diffrence in Stroop test; score of learning, score of maximum learning and long term memory-recall in VMPT. A post hoc analysis (Turkey) was performed. It was determined that there was no difference between schizoaffective and schizophrenia patients on neuropsyhological tasks. However, schizoaffective and schizophrenia patients had significantly poorer performance than control group on neuropsychological tests. Conclusion: Our study show that cognitive functions in patients with schizoaffective disorder and schizophrenia are similar and that they are both impaired compared with healthy controls.