In order to clarify relationships among four dimensions thought to underlie schizophrenia, 52 patients were rated on a scale of premorbid personality and on a scale measuring the process-reactive dimension. They were further categorized with respect to chronicity and the presence of paranoia. Results indicated that the process-reactive, good-poor premorbid personality, and acutechronic dimensions are essentially similar; and that the paranoid-nonparanoid dimension is independent of the others. Testing on a double alternation learning task demonstrated differences between paranoids and nonparanoids, but not between the poles of the other dimensions.

PROBLEM Implicit in much of the recent psychological research on schizophrenia is the assumption that a motivational deficit underlies most of the behavior associated with that disorder. Operationally stated, for schizophrenics, reward is relatively ineffective in motivating learning, and punishment eventuates in definite decrement.The available literature, however, does not reveal the clear-cut picture anticipated. While several studies do show performance decrement following punishment or 6 ) .A more consistent picture emerges with respect to 6 ) , but even here there are contrary reportsc7). Indeed, these results merely reflect the inconsistency of the literature dealing with normols' reactions to st2ress(4).This study proposes t o establish a baseline for evaluating the role of reward and punishment in learning by schizophrenics. I n the past, researchers have often used materials with a high degree of verbal involvement in studies of this type which introduces problems of triggering autistic associations among the schizophrenic groups and thus affecting their performance differentially. I n our study, this factor was circumvented by use of a simple task with minimal verbal involvement. METHODSubjects. Three groups of Ss (paranoid schizophrenics, nonparanoid schizophrenics and normals) were compared on their response t o three reinforcement conditions (reward, punishment, control). Each S was assigned t o one of these conditions and served in that condition alone. Five trials on a letter cancellation task were administered. Scores were computed for each trial period. The resulting design is a 3 X 3 X 5 repeated measures plot, with group and reinforcement class representing nested column variables and trials the row variable.Sixty-three nonparanoid schizophrenics were tested, 24 being assigned t o the reward condition, 24 t o the *, 9 ) , others reveal

Szmzmary.-Data obrained from a cross-sectional study of perceptual changes in chronic schizophrenia were re-analyzed to determine what effects, if any, institutionalization exerted on perception. When duration of illness was held constant, it was found that schizophrenic Ss with a high percentage of institutionalization rime were equivalent to Ss with a low percentage of institutionalization time on three perceptual tasks known to be affected by chronicity. Assertions that psychological changes take place through institutionalization alone are called into question.

It seems possible that gender differences may often be reducible to differences in role. The authors sought to explore the effects of role and gender on hostile and anxious communications. Role was manipulated through the use of the Melian Dialogues, a technique borrowed from community organization training that asks participants alternately to assume roles of superior and inferior power. Fourteen groups of college students, each with a four-member team of women and a four-member team of men, engaged in the Dialogues. Their communications, recorded and transcribed verbatim, were coded according to the Gottschalk-Gleser method of content analysis. A multivariate analysis of variance revealed that while role had a highly significant effect (p < .0001) on the content of the communications, neither gender nor the order in which roles were assumed exerted a significant influence. Results were interpreted as a consequence of role justification.

Although much effort has gone into the description and classification of schizophrenic behaviour patterns, little attempt has been made to detail the course of the disorder. The present paper is an effort to trace the effects of chronicity on perception by use of a cross-sectional method. The specific tasks were selected to maximize autochthonous factors in perception. At the same time a demonstrable sensitivity to emotional states was desired, since changes in the schizophrenic condition are often considered reflections of reaction to stress. A wide enough area of behaviour was encompassed so that a general pattern, if one emerged, could be considered typical of perception as a whole.