Neuropsychology of the Deficit Syndrome: New Data and Meta-analysis of Findings To Date

The deficit syndrome is thought to characterize a pathophysiologically distinct subgroup of patients with schizophrenia. Supporting this notion, prior research examining the neuropsychological correlates of the deficit syndrome has suggested the presence of a differential impairment in frontal and parietal functions. This article reports findings from 2 studies attempting to replicate and extend previous reports of a differential neuropsychological impairment in deficit schizophrenia. In the first study, we administered a comprehensive neuropsychological battery to 20 deficit and 25 nondeficit patients with schizophrenia and 25 normal healthy controls. In the second study, a meta-analysis was conducted of 13 separate studies examining the neuropsychology of the deficit syndrome. There was little evidence from either of the present studies that the deficit syndrome is associated with a selective impairment in frontal and parietal lobe functions. The first study failed to find significant differences in frontal or parietal abilities for deficit vs nondeficit patients. The meta-analytic findings revealed that deficit patients were globally more neuropsychologically impaired than nondeficit patients (effect size [ES] = 0.41). Relative to nondeficit patients, deficit patients performed poorest on tests of olfaction (ES = 1.11), social cognition (ES = 0.56), global cognition (ES = 0.52), and language (ES = 0.51). The neuropsychological impairments associated with the deficit form of schizophrenia do not follow an obvious anatomically defined pattern of impairment. The question of whether deficit patients exhibit a unique cognitive impairment profile will require a more sophisticated and rigorous examination of the neuropsychology of the deficit syndrome.