Leumann Lorenz, Feldon Joram, Vollenweider Franz X, Ludewig Katja
Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, University of Zurich, Switzerland.
Biol Psychiatry. 2002 Oct 1;52(7):729-39. doi: 10.1016/s0006-3223(02)01344-6.
Prepulse inhibition and latent inhibition are the two animal paradigms currently dominating neuropharmacological research on attentional deficits in schizophrenia. Both paradigms have been shown to have a reasonable amount of face, predictive, and construct validity, but responsiveness to typical and atypical antipsychotics differs between the two, as indicated by animal and human studies. The relationship between the paradigms in schizophrenic patients is still unclear.
We tested prepulse inhibition and auditory latent inhibition in a sample of 33 chronic schizophrenic patients medicated either with atypical (n = 17) or typical (n = 16) antipsychotics.
Latent inhibition was found to be intact in both patient groups. Prepulse inhibition was intact in the group receiving atypicals, but deficient in the group receiving typicals (at 60 msec lead interval condition).
The direct comparison supports the hypothesis that atypical and typical antipsychotics have different effects on prepulse inhibition than on latent inhibition in schizophrenic patients; however, the results may also be explained by a greater sensitivity of the prepulse inhibition method. Because it is crucial to understand why there are considerable differences between the two paradigms and between human and animal studies, research should focus more strongly on comparative approaches.
前脉冲抑制和潜伏抑制是目前主导精神分裂症注意力缺陷神经药理学研究的两种动物范式。动物和人类研究表明，这两种范式都具有一定程度的表面效度、预测效度和结构效度，但两者对典型和非典型抗精神病药物的反应不同。这两种范式在精神分裂症患者中的关系仍不清楚。
我们对33例服用非典型（n = 17）或典型（n = 16）抗精神病药物的慢性精神分裂症患者样本进行了前脉冲抑制和听觉潜伏抑制测试。
发现两组患者的潜伏抑制均完整。接受非典型药物治疗的组前脉冲抑制完整，但接受典型药物治疗的组前脉冲抑制不足（在60毫秒超前间隔条件下）。
直接比较支持以下假设：在精神分裂症患者中，非典型和典型抗精神病药物对前脉冲抑制和潜伏抑制的影响不同；然而，结果也可能由前脉冲抑制方法的更高敏感性来解释。由于理解这两种范式之间以及人类和动物研究之间存在显著差异的原因至关重要，研究应更加强调比较方法。
