Eye Movement Dysfunction as a Biological Marker of Risk for Schizophrenia

Abstract

Evidence for the specificity of SPEM dysfunction to diagnosed schizophrenia, as well as to healthy individuals with a genetic vulnerability to schizophrenia, suggests that the SPEM task has efficacy as a test of gene carrier status in schizophrenia, and therefore as a trait marker of risk for schizophrenia. Future studies should seek to explore the relationships between SPEM and other eye movement dysfunctions (antisaccades, express saccades), in view of evidence that some of these dysfunctions also show specificity for schizophrenia.

An Eye Tracking Study on Feigned Schizophrenia

“…Calkins et al (2008) reported that smooth pursuit dysfunction is considered one of the most promising candidate endophenotype of schizophrenia (Erlenmeyer-Kimling & Cornblatt, 1987;Holzman, 1987;Iacono, 1983Iacono, , 1988Iacono, , 1998 Except for the comparison of mean latency in the anti-saccade tasks, for all other comparisons, because homoscedasticity could not be assumed, the Welch-Satterthwaite method was used to adjust degrees of freedom. Lee & Williams, 2000;Siever & Coursey, 1985;Siever et al, 1982;Venables, 1991). In particular, RMSE appears to be a meaningful measure of eye tracking performance that seems to be unable to be voluntarily replicated by participants instructed to feign.…”