Social Cognition in Schizophrenia: Does Culture Matter?

by

Francesca Li
Francesca Li

Francesca Li is a rising senior from Moorestown New Jersey, where she graduated from Moorestown High School. At Wesleyan, Francesca is majoring in Neuroscience and Behavior and minoring in Chemistry. She is a member of the Women’s Lacrosse team, a part of the Wesleyan Individual tutoring program and a member of the Kurtz Lab. Outside of school she loves to swim, play spikeball and play with her dog . After college she hopes to go to medical school!

Zanny Weinreb
Zanny Weinreb

Zanny Weinreb is a rising senior (‘22) from Newton, Massachusetts, where she graduated from Newton South High School. At Wesleyan, Zanny is majoring in psychology, part of the Wesleyan Doula Project, and a member of the Kurtz lab. She loves the ocean and aquatic life, exploring new places, and going to classmate’s performances at Wes. After college, she is thinking about going to nursing school to become a nurse practitioner.

Abstract: Schizophrenia occurs in around 1% of the population worldwide and is diagnosed in all cultures and socioeconomic groups. Individuals with schizophrenia experience varying levels of social cognitive deficits in domains such as theory of mind, empathy, affect recognition, attributional style and social perception. These deficits may serve as barriers to normal social interactions and affect functional outcome due to the increased difficulty perceiving/responding to the actions of others and correctly identifying social contexts. This could result in difficulties maintaining employment, functioning in the community and communicating with others. Evidence comparing cross-cultural differences using psychometrically strong social cognitive measures, most of which were developed in the US and UK, is lacking. There has been limited consideration of how culture and social norms affect the function and accuracy of these measures to assess social cognitive deficits, and whether social cognitive ability differs around the world. The following meta-analysis aims to fill in some of these gaps by investigating the cross-cultural validity of social cognitive measures created in Western countries. Relevant studies, published in or after 1980, and collected from the PsychINFO, PubMed, CINAHL, and ProQuest Dissertations and Theses databases were coded and then analyzed using Comprehensive Meta-Analysis software. We chose to focus specifically on eight measures identified by experts in the Social Cognition Psychometric Evaluation (SCOPE) trial as the best existing measures of social cognition (Pinkham et al, 2014). Insight into how culture influences the measurement and expression of social cognition could help lead to the development of more culturally-sensitive approaches to the assessment, treatment, and understanding of schizophrenia. More accurate measures of social cognitive deficits will ultimately allow for more effective treatment intervention for people with schizophrenia all around the world.

Video:

https://wesleyan.zoom.us/j/98650008385?pwd=RXoyOVR5N2Y4WFFaNWFXZnRvU2d1dz09

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