Social Processes in individuals at clinical high-risk for psychosis

描述(由申请人提供)：社交缺陷是精神分裂症的一个特征，最近的证据表明，这种缺陷可能在精神病的前驱阶段(紧接第一次精神病发作之前的阶段)明显。当前对社会过程的概念化概括了四个功能结构，包括从属关系和依恋、社会交流、对自我的感知/理解以及对他人的感知/理解。这种理解社交过程的方法突出了对社会行为的维度理解，并强调从多个层面的分析(例如，大脑、行为、自我报告等)来评估这些结构。尽管到目前为止，已有几项研究表明社会加工功能障碍与前驱症状有关(例如，情绪识别和心理理论)，但还没有多模式研究来确定这四种结构的功能。澄清我们对临床高危人群(CHR)(那些被认为符合前驱综合征临床标准的人)的社交过程的理解将有助于更广泛地增加我们对社交过程的知识，并提高我们对精神病病因的理解。该项目旨在阐明CHR群体中社会过程的性质，测试四种结构之间的神经解剖学相关性，并评估精神病症状和社会过程之间的关系的个体差异。在这项研究中，40名有前驱症状的人和40名对照将通过多层次的分析(即行为、成像、自我报告)进行评估。社会结构将被测量如下：从属关系和依恋的测量将通过结构化的先兆综合征访谈(SIPS)来评估；社会沟通将使用各种与情绪相关的任务(ER-40、FEDT、MSCEIT)以及调查问卷来评估，以获得社会沟通的更有成效的方面(社会反应性量表、社交沟通问卷、广泛的自闭症表型)；对自我的感知/理解将使用Beck认知洞察力量表和量表来评估对精神障碍的不觉察；最后，对他人的感知/理解将使用社会推理意识测试来评估。结构张量成像和扩散张量成像也将用于评估目前被认为参与社会功能的神经区域和电路。在整个项目过程中，申请者将接受社会进程、工作 在情感神经成像、成像数据的统计分析和前驱症状方面与该领域的专家合作。这一培训计划包括课程作业、社会领域的专门培训、座谈/会议出席以及与发起人/共同发起人的合作，将使申请者能够有效地完成当前的提案，并发展必要的技能，以从事独立的研究职业，调查社会过程，特别是这一功能领域如何在精神障碍中表现出来。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Social deficits are a hallmark characteristic of schizophrenia, and recent evidence suggests that this impairment may be evident in the prodromal stage of psychosis (the stage immediately preceding the first episode of psychosis). The current conceptualization of social processes outlines four functional constructs including affiliation and attachment, social communication, perception/understanding of self, and perception/understanding of others. This approach to understanding social processing highlights a dimensional understanding of social behavior and emphasizes assessing these constructs from multiple levels of analyses (e.g., brain, behavior, self-report, etc.). Although several distict studies have implicated areas of social processing dysfunction in the prodrome (e.g., emotion recognition and theory of mind) to date, there have been no multimodal investigations designed to determine functioning across the four constructs. Clarifying our understanding of social processing in a clinical high-risk group (CHR) (those deemed to meet clinical criteria for a prodromal syndrome) stands to increase our knowledge of social processing more broadly as well as improve our understanding of the etiology of psychosis. This project aims to clarify the nature of social processes in a CHR group, test for neuroanatomical correlates of the four constructs, and to assess for individual differences in the relationship between psychotic symptoms and social processes. In this study, 40 individuals with a prodromal syndrome and 40 controls will be evaluated by using multiple levels of analysis (i.e., behavior, imaging, self-report). Social constructs will be measured as follows: Affiliation and attachment will be assessed using a measure of social anhedonia from the Structured Interview for Prodromal Syndromes (SIPS); social communication will be evaluated using various emotion-related tasks (ER-40, FEDT, MSCEIT) as well as questionnaires to get at more productive aspects of social communication (social responsiveness scale, social communication questionnaire, broad autism phenotype); perception/understanding of self will be measured using the Beck Cognitive Insight Scale and Scale to Assess Unawareness of Mental Disorder insight scales; finally, perception/understanding of others will be assessed using The Awareness of Social Inference Test. Structural and diffusion tensor imaging will also be used in order to evaluate neural regions and circuitry currently believed to be involved in social functioning. Throughout the course of this project, the applicant will receive education and training in social processes, work with experts in the field in regards to affective neuroimaging, statistical analyses of imaging data, and prodromal syndromes. This training plan, incorporating coursework, specialized training in social domains, colloquia/conference attendance, and work with the Sponsor/Co-Sponsors will enable the applicant to effectively complete the current proposal as well as develop the necessary skills to pursue an independent research career investigating social processes, and specifically, how this functioning domain manifests in psychotic disorders.