Topograhic distribution of human brain electrical activity associated with schizophrenia
Creators: name: Ciorciari, Joseph
Publisher: name: Swinburne
Year: 2024

description: A literature review of the schizophrenia brain electrophysiology was undertaken with specific emphasis placed on the topographical distribution of evoked potentials (EPs). The outcomes of this review suggests that schizophrenia brain electrophysiology, demonstrate some differences, but with a variability reflective of the symptom heterogeneity. The literature associated with the use of attentional tasks while recording EPs, tended to demonstrate some consistency. The methodological issues associated with the EEG and EP recordings may also account for this variability. An evoked potential technique, which has been demonstrated to be sensitive to the changes in cognitive processes associated with attention, is the Steady State Probe Topography (SSPT) technique. The SSPT is a combination of both the Steady State Visual Evoked Potential (SSVEP) and the Probe-ERP paradigm. This technique allows the SSVEP to be measured continuously, is relatively insensitive to artifact, and can display the topographic distribution of the SSVEP measures during the attentional task. The technique employs the use of a sixty-four channel EEG recording system. This consists of a multichannel electrode helmet; multichannel amplifier/filter, task presentation computer and a computer controlled data acquisition system. Software was also developed to analyse the recorded brain electrical activity to produce the SSVEP magnitude and phase versus time series for each electrode site. The topographic distribution of the SSVEP measures associated with specific events during attentional tasks could also be displayed. At the time of the pilot study, this technique had not been applied previously to the study of schizophrenia and therefore warranted further study. Two separate studies are reported; an investigative pilot study and a chronic group study. The pilot SSVEP and schizophrenia study was designed to examine the changes in the SSVEP and its topography, during the performance of a number of attentional or activation tasks to examine the possibility of hypofrontality. The tasks selected for the study were those previously used for the examination of hypofrontality with metabolic imaging techniques; the Continuous Performance Task (CPT) and the Wisconsin Card Sort (WCS). The SSVEP was elicited by a superimposed 13Hz flicker on the visual field, while subjects performed computerised versions of the neuropsychological tasks. Topographical maps of the SSVEP magnitude distribution were then interpolated and displayed as an animated sequence synchronised with particular events occurring during the tasks. In comparison to the male control group, male schizophrenic patients exhibited differences in the SSVEP topography for all tasks, possibly reflecting the deficits in behavioural indices. Overall, the findings indicated that the technique demonstrated some merit for further examination of frontal SSVEP topography in schizophrenia. In a larger study of twenty chronic schizophrenia patients, the frontal topographical distribution of the SSVEP was examined. The earlier pilot study finding of reduced frontal SSVEP amplitude was replicated. The issue of hypofrontality in schizophrenia was applied as a possible interpretation.