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Towards a Neuropsychology of Schizophrenia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Christopher D. Frith  and
D. John Done
Christopher D. Frith*
Affiliation:
CRC Division of Psychiatry, Watford Road, Harrow HA1 3UJ
D. John Done
Affiliation:
CRC Division of Psychiatry, Watford Road, Harrow HA1 3UJ
*
∗Correspondence
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Abstract

A viable neuropsychology of schizophrenia requires, first, that signs and symptoms be understood in terms of underlying psychological processes and, second, that these underlying processes be related to brain systems. We propose that the negative signs of schizophrenia reflect a defect in the initiation of spontaneous action, while the positive symptoms reflect a defect in the internal monitoring of action. The spontaneous initiation of action depends upon brain systems linking the prefrontal cortex and the basal ganglia. Internal monitoring, carried out in the hippocampus, of spontaneous action, depends upon links between the prefrontal cortex and the hippocampus via the parahippocampal cortex and the cingulate cortex.

Type
Review Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 153 , Issue 4 , October 1988 , pp. 437 - 443
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1988 

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Footnotes

Extended version of a lecture given at a Royal College of Psychiatrists' meeting in January 1987, as part of the Maudsley Bequest series.

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