Metacognitive functioning predicts positive and negative symptoms over 12 months in first episode psychosis

Hamish J. McLeod, Andrew I. Gumley, Angus MacBeth, Matthias Schwannauer, Paul H. Lysaker

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

76 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

The negative symptoms of schizophrenia are a major source of impairment and distress but both pharmacological and psychological treatment options provide only modest benefit. Developing more effective psychological treatments for negative symptoms will require a more sophisticated understanding of the psychological processes that are implicated in their development and maintenance. We extended previous work by demonstrating that metacognitive functioning is related to negative symptom expression across the first 12 months of first episode psychosis (FEP). Previous studies in this area have either been cross-sectional or have used much older participants with long-standing symptoms. In this study, forty-five FEP participants were assessed three times over 12 months and provided data on PANSS rated symptoms, premorbid adjustment, metacognitive functioning, and DUP. Step-wise linear regression showed that adding metacognition scores to known predictors of negative symptoms (baseline symptom severity, gender, DUP, and premorbid academic and social adjustment) accounted for 62% of the variance in PANSS negative symptom scores at six months and 38% at 12 months. The same predictors also explained 47% of the variance in positive symptoms at both six and 12 months. However, exploration of the simple correlations between PANSS symptom scores and metacognition suggests a stronger univariate relationship between metacognition and negative symptoms. Overall, the results indicate that problems with mental state processing may be important determinants of negative symptom expression from the very early stages of psychosis. These results provide further evidence that metacognitive functioning is a potentially relevant target for psychological interventions.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)109-115
Number of pages7
JournalJournal of Psychiatric Research
Volume54
Early online date10 Apr 2014
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jul 2014

Keywords

  • metacognition
  • negative symptoms
  • first episode psychosis

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Metacognitive functioning predicts positive and negative symptoms over 12 months in first episode psychosis'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this