Elsevier

Schizophrenia Research

Volume 218, April 2020, Pages 219-225
Schizophrenia Research

The placement of anomalous self-experiences within schizotypal personality in a nonclinical sample

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.schres.2019.12.043Get rights and content

Abstract

Anomalous self-experiences are disturbances in the subjective experience of the self and have been shown to be related to the premorbid, prodromal, acute, and chronic phases of schizophrenia-spectrum disorders. Despite having a long history in psychopathology research, anomalous self-experiences are not explicitly represented in any major nosology of mental disorders. Previous research suggests that anomalous self-experiences are correlated, but distinct from other aspects of schizotypal personality, but this has not been examined with confirmatory factor analysis. The current research aimed to examine where anomalous self-experiences fit within the structure of schizotypal personality including cognitive-perceptual, interpersonal, disorganized, and paranoid factors. It also examined the measurement invariance of the factor structure across ethnicity and between sexes. Seven hundred forty-four participants completed multiple measures of anomalous self-experiences and schizotypal personality. The best fitting model was a five-factor model with anomalous self-experiences, cognitive-perceptual, interpersonal, disorganized, and paranoid factors. This model fit better than models with anomalous self-experiences loading on any of the four schizotypal personality factors. The structure had configural, metric, and scalar invariance across race/ethnicities, but lacked scalar invariance between sexes. Anomalous self-experience scores did not differ among race/ethnicity or between sexes. These results suggest that anomalous self-experiences are highly correlated with but distinct from other facets of schizotypal personality. Future research may examine whether anomalous self-experiences should be added to nosologies of psychotic-spectrum disorders.

Section snippets

The placement of anomalous self-experiences within schizotypal personality

Anomalous self-experiences (ASEs) are disturbances in the subjective experience of the self (Parnas et al., 2005), and have a long history in descriptive psychiatry (Parnas, 2011). Early conceptualizations of schizophrenia suggested ASEs are core features of the disorder (Bleuler, 1911). Despite this history, disturbances in self-processing are not included in any current major nosology of psychotic-spectrum disorders, such as the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10; World Health

Participants

Participants were 744 undergraduates at a large public Pacific university who participated in exchange for partial completion of a course requirement. All students in psychology courses had the option to sign up for the study on the online system SONA. Seven hundred fifty-one participants provided informed consent, and 744 participants completed the study. Their mean age was 20.11 (SD = 3.60). The sample was diverse, with 30.6% East Asian, 23.9% White, 17.7% Southeast Asian, 11.6% Multiracial,

Data analysis

All models were fit using Mplus 8.1 software (Muthen and Muthen, 1998-2019) using MLR, with standard errors that are robust to non-normality of data. The absolute fit of the models was assessed with Root Mean Squared Error of Approximation (RMSEA), Comparative Fit Index (CFI), Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI), and Standardized Root Mean Squared Residual (SRMSR). Following conventional criteria, RMSEA and SRMSR values <0.10 were considered acceptable and <0.05 were considered excellent. CFI and TLI

Results

First, we examined the zero-order correlations of all of the measures. As can be seen in Supplemental Table 1, all of the anomalous self-experiences and schizotypal personality variables were positively correlated with each other.

Next, we examined the placement of ASEs on the factor models. As can be seen in Table 1, Model 5, in which ASEs form a separate, fifth factor, fit the data well according to the RMSEA, CFI, and SRMR statistics (see Fig. 1). This model also fit better, according to the

Discussion

The results of the current research suggest that ASEs are distinct from other facets of schizotypal personality. This is consistent with a long line of research into self-disturbances in schizophrenia-spectrum disorders, which suggests that ASEs are highly correlated with, but distinct from positive symptoms of schizophrenia (Henriksen and Parnas, 2012). In the current research, a factor model with separate ASE, cognitive-perceptual, paranoid, interpersonal, and disorganized schizotypal

Contributors

David C. Cicero designed the study, collected the data, conducted the statistical analyses, and wrote the first draft of the manuscript. Lukasz Gaweda and Barnaby Nelson edited the manuscript and contributed important conceptual input. All authors contributed to and have approved the final manuscript.

Role of funding source

The current study was not funded.

Declaration of competing interest

All authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

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