The contingent negative variation in positive and negative types of schizophrenia.

The authors analyzed the contingent negative variations of 20 medicated patients with schizophrenia diagnosed according to DSM-III-R and 20 age- and sex-matched normal comparison subjects. For the patients with schizophrenia, there were significant correlations between contingent negative variation amplitude and two items on the Scale for the Assessment of Negative Symptoms (affective flattening and avolition-apathy) and the total score on this scale. These findings have implications regarding the underlying pathology of negative and positive symptoms of schizophrenia.