Eye tracking impairment: attentional and psychometric correlates in psychiatric patients.

The correlations between eye tracking and a set of attentional and psychometric correlates of psychopathology were studied in groups of schizophrenic, nonschizophrenic psychotic, schizotypal, and neurotic patients (DSM-III criteria), and in a normal control group. Measures of overall and of optimum eye tracking performance were employed. Attentional measures were: reaction time, crossover phenomenon, omission score on the continuous performance test, and amplitude of the contingent negative variation. Psychometric measures were: psychoticism, extraversion, and neuroticism. A measure of eye tracking based on the best cycle in the total sequence proved superior to the overall score as a correlate of psychopathology. The correlational patterns differed widely between groups. Most conspicuous were the correlations of eye tracking with psychoticism in psychotics, especially in schizophrenics, and the impressive number of significant correlations with attentional as well as psychometric variables in the schizophrenic category.