The current study examined the factor structure of the Brief Negative Symptom Scale (BNSS), a next-generation negative symptom rating instrument developed in response to the NIMH-sponsored Consensus Development Conference on Negative Symptoms. Participants included 146 individuals with a DSM-IV diagnosis of schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder. Principal axis factoring indicated two distinct factors explaining 68.7% of the variance. Similar to previous findings, the factors reflected motivation and pleasure and emotional expressivity. These findings provide further support for the construct validity of the BNSS, and for the existence of these two negative symptom factors.

Contrary to early conceptualizations of emotional experience in schizophrenia (SZ), recent research indicates that patients do not self-report less in-the-moment pleasure than controls (CN). Rather, patients report experiencing elevated levels of negative emotionality in response to a range of evocative stimuli. In this study, we examined the possibility that elevations in negative emotionality in SZ may reflect an underlying emotion regulation abnormality. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded from outpatients with SZ (n = 25) and demographically matched healthy controls (n = 21) during passive viewing of unpleasant and neutral photographs. Unpleasant images were preceded by an audio description that described the image as being either negative or neutral. Neutral images were preceded by neutral audio descriptions. The late positive potential (LPP), an ERP component sensitive to cognitive change strategies, was examined as an index of emotion regulation. Both CN and SZ showed an increased LPP to negatively described unpleasant images compared with neutral images. In addition, CN showed evidence of emotion regulation, as reflected by a smaller LPP for unpleasant images preceded by a neutral descriptor, relative to a negative descriptor. In contrast, SZ patients showed an inability to downregulate emotional response, as evidenced by no difference in the amplitude of the LPP for unpleasant images preceded by negative or neutral descriptors. Findings provide neurophysiological evidence for an emotion regulation abnormality in SZ and suggest that failures in cognitive change may underlie increased negative emotionality in SZ.

The current study examined the psychometric properties of the Brief Negative Symptom Scale (BNSS), a next-generation rating instrument developed in response to the NIMH sponsored consensus development conference on negative symptoms. Participants included 100 individuals with a DSM-IV diagnosis of schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder who completed a clinical interview designed to assess negative, positive, disorganized, and general psychiatric symptoms, as well as functional outcome. A battery of anhedonia questionnaires and neuropsychological tests were also administered. Results indicated that the BNSS has excellent internal consistency and temporal stability, as well as good convergent and discriminant validity in its relationships with other symptom rating scales, functional outcome, self-reported anhedonia, and neuropsychological test scores. Given its brevity (13-items, 15-minute interview) and good psychometric characteristics, the BNSS can be considered a promising new instrument for use in clinical trials.

No abstract

Schizophrenia is characterized by profound impairment in the motivation for social affiliation. Negative symptoms are associated with such impairment but the contribution of behavioral skill deficits is unclear. In this study we utilized a novel video paradigm to assess performance-based affiliative behavioral skills in individuals with schizophrenia (N = 48) and community controls (N = 29). Individuals with schizophrenia displayed significant impairment in behavioral affiliative skills compared to controls; however, in response to the affiliative interaction the groups did not differ on self-reported affective responding, appraisal of the interaction partner, or desire to interact with the partner in the future. Importantly, within the patient group more severe negative symptoms (particularly those related to motivation and pleasure) were associated with poorer affiliative social skills and this relationship was independent of instrumental (non-social) skills, depression or positive symptoms. More severe negative symptoms were also associated with less positive affect in response to the interaction and less positive appraisals of the interaction partner. Self-reported social anhedonia was related to patients’ diminished willingness to interact with the partner in the future. These results demonstrate that negative symptoms in schizophrenia are related to both affiliative skills deficits and less affiliative subjective responses to interaction partners.