A Study of Schizophrenics?? Ability to Localize the Source of a Sound

Abstract

Process, nonparanoid [human] schizophrenics [12], nonschizophrenic psychiatric controls [12] and normal controls [12] were given an auditory localization task. Performance was measured by the number of correct localizations and was studied as a function of 3 variables: diagnosis; position of the apparatus in relation to the subject''s median plane (right or left); and the degree of displacement of the auditory stimulus from a fixation point (4.5.degree., 3.0.degree. and 1.5.degree.). A 3-way analysis of variance with 2 repeated measures resulted in a significant main effect for each of the 3 independent variables. Orthogonal comparisons indicated no difference in performance between normal and psychiatric controls but a significant difference between schizophrenics and the combined controls. The degree of displacement of the auditory stimulus resulted in a significant linear trend in performance. There were no significant interactions. Process, nonparanoid schizophrenics may suffer from a specific deficit in auditory localization.