Changes in emotion processing and social cognition with auditory versus visual neuroscience-informed cognitive training in individuals with schizophrenia.

BACKGROUND: Neuroscience-informed cognitive training has been used to remediate cognitive deficits in schizophrenia, but their effect on emotion processing and social cognition deficits, which may involve auditory and visual impairments, remain relatively unknown. In this study, we compared the efficacy of auditory versus visual neuroscience-informed cognitive training on emotion processing and social cognition in individuals with schizophrenia. METHODS: In this randomised, double-blind clinical trial, 79 participants with chronic schizophrenia performed 40-hours auditory or visual dynamically equivalent computerised cognitive training. We assessed emotion processing and social cognition using Emotion Recognition, Affective Go-NoGo, Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional-Intelligence, Theory of mind, and Hinting tests before and after 20 h and 40 h of training. RESULTS: After training, participants from both groups decreased their reaction time for facial emotion recognition (p = 3 × 10-6, d = 0.9). This was more remarkable for the auditory group when analysing individual emotions. Both groups also reduced omissions in the affective go-no go (p = 0.01, d = 0.6), which was also attributed, post hoc, to the auditory group. Trends for improvement were observed in theory of mind (p = 0.06, d = 0.6) for both groups. Improvement in emotion processing was associated with improvement in reasoning and problem solving and global cognition and improvement in theory of mind was associated with improvement in attention and global cognition. CONCLUSIONS: Both the auditory and the visual neuroscience-informed cognitive training were efficacious at improving emotion processing and social cognition in individuals with schizophrenia, although improvement was more remarkable for the auditory training group. These improvements were related to cognitive - but not symptom - improvement.

Auditory versus visual neuroscience-informed cognitive training in schizophrenia: Effects on cognition, symptoms and quality of life.

BACKGROUND: Cognitive impairments are related to deficits in primary auditory and visual sensory processes in schizophrenia. These impairments can be remediated by neuroscience-informed computerized cognitive trainings that target auditory and visual processes. However, it is not clear which modality results in greater improvements in cognition, symptoms and quality of life. We aimed to investigate the impact of training auditory versus visual cognitive processes in global cognition in patients with schizophrenia. METHODS: Seventy-nine schizophrenia participants were randomly assigned to either 40 h of auditory or visual computerized training. Auditory and visual exercises were chosen to be dynamically equivalent and difficulties increased progressively during the training. We evaluated cognition, symptoms and quality of life before, after 20 h, and after 40 h of training. ClinicalTrials.gov (1R03TW009002-01). RESULTS: Participants who received the visual training showed significant improvements in global cognition compared to the auditory training group. The visual training significantly improved attention and reasoning and problem-solving, while the auditory training improved reasoning and problem-solving only. Schizophrenia symptoms improved after training in both groups, whereas quality of life remained unchanged. Interestingly, there was a significant and positive correlation between improvements in attention and symptoms in the visual training group. CONCLUSIONS: We conclude that the visual training and the auditory training are differentially efficient at remediating cognitive deficits and symptoms of clinically stable schizophrenia patients. Ongoing follow-up of participants will evaluate the durability of training effects on cognition and symptoms, as well as the potential impact on quality of life over time.

Validation of the Brazilian brief version of the temperament auto-questionnaire TEMPS-A: the brief TEMPS-Rio de Janeiro.

BACKGROUND: Over the last thirty years, Akiskal and collaborators have described and developed operationalized diagnostic criteria for five types of affective temperaments - cyclothymic, irritable, hyperthymic, depressive, and anxious. A 110-item, yes-or-no questionnaire, the Temperament Evaluation of Memphis, Pisa, Paris, and San Diego (TEMPS-A), was specifically developed for measuring temperamental variation. The TEMPS-A was translated into more than 25 languages and cross-culturally valid versions are now available in Italian, French, German, Japanese, Turkish, Arabic, Polish, Hungarian, Spanish and Portuguese. Recent studies in the US and in Europe, however, have suggested that shorter versions of TEMPS-A can be just as efficient as the full ones while potentially enhancing the compliance of respondents. The main objective of the present study was to validate a brief Brazilian Portuguese version of TEMPS-A (brief TEMPS-Rio de Janeiro). METHODS: Our main sample consisted of 997 undergraduate students (female = 72.6%) from seven different universities located in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. An additional group of 167 healthy senior citizens (women = 83.8%) was recruited in senior community centers in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. All participants were asked to complete the 110-item, Brazilian translation of the full version of the TEMPS-A. RESULTS: An exploratory factor analysis (PCA type 2, Varimax rotation) vying for a five-factor solution yielded mixed results, with cyclothymic traits, physical symptoms of anxiety and preoccupation with the well-being of a family member loading together on the first factor. When a forced six-factor solution was attempted, cyclothymic, irritable, hyperthymic, and depressive were delineated as predicted by the theory. The original generalized anxious temperament was split into two sharply delimited components, a "worrying" subscale and an abbreviated anxious subscale, which included physical symptoms of anxiety and concerns with the well-being of relatives. Based on the tripartite model of anxiety and depression, we proposed that the abridged anxious subscale, which includes physical symptoms of anxiety, represents the "true" generalized anxious temperament, while the "worrying" subscale corresponds to the "general distress factor". The internal consistency of the six subscales thus identified was generally good, ranging from 0.67 (anxious subscale) to 0.81 (worrying subscale), with cyclothymic, irritable, depressive, and hyperthymic subscales exhibiting intermediate values (0.74, 0.74, 0.72, and 0.7, respectively). LIMITATIONS: The present study was based on a non-clinical sample that does not reflect accurately the characteristics of the Brazilian population. The relative uniformity of the sample in terms of age and education precluded a more in-depth analysis of the influence of these highly relevant factors. Further, we did not assess convergent, divergent or test-retest validity. CONCLUSIONS: We believe that the brief Brazilian version of the TEMPS-A auto-questionnaire will provide Brazilian researchers and clinicians with a psychometrically sound instrument and thus contribute toward the creation of a worldwide research network dedicated to the investigation of affective temperaments.