Psychotic experience and disordered thinking: A reappraisal from new perspectives

Author(s): Wiggins, O. P., Spitzer, M.

Journal/Book: J Nerv Ment Dis. 1997; 185: 351 West Camden St, Baltimore, MD 21201-2436. Williams & Wilkins. 176-187.

Abstract: The reports of a person suffering from loose associations and disordered behavior serve as the basis for a phenomenology of some central components of psychotic experience. Especially salient are ''the expansion of the horizon of meanings,'' ''the emergence of explicit experiences from implicit ones,'' and ''the reduction of complexity.'' The phenomenological concepts thus developed supplement recent discoveries in neuroscience and experimental psychopathology. Cognitive neuroscientists have depicted the surface of the brain as a repository of self-organizing cortical maps of mental life. Furthermore, experimental psychopathologists have characterized semantic associative networks in normal experience and in psychosis. The authors conclude by joining the phenomenology of psychotic consciousness with the findings of these neuroscientists and experimental psychopathologists.

Note: Article Schwartz MA, Case Western Reserve Univ, Univ Hosp Cleveland, Dept Psychiat, 11100 Euclid Ave, Cleveland,OH 44106 USA

Keyword(s): MASSIVE CORTICAL REORGANIZATION; ADULT OWL MONKEYS; SCHIZOPHRENIC-PATIENTS; WORKING-MEMORY; PLASTICITY; DEAFFERENTATION; REPRESENTATION; NEURONS; 3B

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