- research shows that there is reduced activation patterns when doing cognitive tasks in parts of the brain compared to non-schizophrenic patients
- hyper-activation in regions not associated with certain cognitive tasks
- reduced fMRI activity when handed affective empathy tasks

Regional Activation Patterns

makes use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to explore cognitive processing impairment in the brain, more specifically the regions and neural circuits that contribute to the impairment

Michigan State University

A set of symptoms of schizophrenia that affects the normal processes of the brain that helps day to day functioning

Cognitive Impairment

Green, M. F., Horan, W. P., &amp; Lee, J. (2019). Nonsocial and social cognition in schizophrenia: Current evidence and Future Directions. World Psychiatry, 18(2), 146–161. https://doi.org/10.1002/wps.20624 

Nonsocial and social cognition in schizophrenia: current evidence and future directions

Functional Neuroimaging

- working memory tasks: Observed reduced connectivity in regions of the brain (prefrontal cortex -> parietal cortex; thalamus -> frontoparietal region; prefrontal cortex -> basal ganglia)
- episodic memory tasks: reduced connectivity between hippocampus and frontal regions
- facial processing: reduced functional connectivity in limbic structures

Functional Connectivity

- Memory retention is impaired in Alzheimer's disease, but it is intact in schizophrenia.
- Schizophrenia patients tend to be more impaired on nonsocial and social cognition when compared to patients with bipolar disorder.
- A few studies found comparable impairment between people with schizophrenia and adults with autism on facial affect recognition and mentalizing, but more research needs to be done to decide whether the two disorders have a pattern of distinct impairments across social and nonsocial cognition.

Cognitive Impairment in Schizophrenia vs. Other Disorders

- Patients that recently experienced a psychotic episode showed that performance on cognitive tasks remained stable over time, however this is not always the case for older schizophrenia patients that tend to show worsening nonsocial cognitive performance.
- Findings support the notion of premorbid deficits in nonsocial cognition in schizophrenia and the presence of cognitive impairment before clinical manifestations emerge. 

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