"Schizophrenia, Consciousness, and the Self" Twenty Years Later: Revisiting the Ipseity-Disturbance Model and the Developmental Nature of Self-Disorder in the Schizophrenia Spectrum.

Self-disorders—non-psychotic anomalous self-experiences—cluster specifically in schizophrenia spectrum disorders, including familial high-risk groups. Over three decades, the concept has matured from clinical observations into a defined research domain. Self-disorders serve as a quantifiable trait phenotype for genetic liability and as a risk phenotype that precedes overt symptoms like schizotypal features and positive, negative, and disorganized symptoms. This framework offers insights into the nature of these conditions and holds promise for improving diagnostic accuracy, prognostic assessments, and intervention targets.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Self-disorders (SD) designate a pattern of non-psychotic anomalous self-experiences, which specifically aggregate in clinical and subclinical forms of schizophrenia spectrum disorders (SSD), including familial high-risk configurations. SD have been corroborated as a valuable, quantitatively tractable, trait phenotype for indexing genetic liability to SSD, and, as a risk phenotype, they offer critical insights into the nature of these complex conditions which precede and shape the development of more overt clinical manifestations (including schizotypal features and positive, negative, and disorganized symptoms). In the last three decades, the concept of self-disorders has evolved from early clinical observations to a well-defined research domain, offering a nuanced understanding of schizophrenia spectrum vulnerabilities and holding promise for improving diagnostic accuracy, enhancing prognostic assessments, offering novel targets for intervention, and advancing our understanding of the schizophrenia spectrum.