Attentional and eye tracking deficits correlate with negative symptoms in schizophrenia

Thirty patients with a DSM-III-R diagnosis of schizophrenia were assessed for severity of schizophrenic symptoms using the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS) and were tested on a Continuous Performance Test (CPT) and a smooth pursuit eye tracking task. Negative symptoms were significantly correlated with eye tracking impairment (r= 0.43, p<0.01) and CPT deficits (r=0.67, p<0.001), but performance on neither task was correlated with positive symptoms. CPT performance and eye tracking performance were modestly correlated with each other (r=0.39, p<0.01) and CPT performance was found to be a stronger predictor of negative symptoms than eye tracking performance. Those data indicate that neurocognitive markers of vulnerability to schizophrenia are associated with negative rather than positive symptoms.