Schizophrenia is a severe psychiatric disorder that has a profound effect on the individuals affected, their caregivers, and society. The schizophrenia construct has evolved over time, with varying definitions and diagnostic boundaries, and is increasingly recognized as a collection of phenotypically similar syndromes, rather than a single disease entity. The illness expresses as a probabilistic, non-deterministic trajectory, ranging from premorbid vulnerability and risk states to clinically manifest psychosis across lifetime. Individuals present with diverse positive, negative, and cognitive symptoms. While the three-dimensional model of positive, negative, and disorganization symptoms is the most popular, it has been criticized as too simplistic, and more complex models have been proposed; however, there is no consensus as to the number and nature of dimensions necessary to encompass the entirety of heterogenous symptoms of schizophrenia.

This slide deck was developed by Professor Dr. Andrea Raballo, Faculty of Biomedical Sciences, University of Lugano, Switzerland; and Professor Dr. Christoph Correll, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany, in collaboration with Cambridge (a division of Prime, Cambridge, UK).

Index for
slide deck

Introduction

History, definitions, and diagnosis
History, definitions, and diagnosis
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Introduction and history of schizophrenia

Introduction and history of schizophrenia
Introduction and history of schizophrenia
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Why does schizophrenia remain foundational to psychiatry?
Why does schizophrenia remain foundational to psychiatry?

Schizophrenia cannot be understood by counting symptoms (such as hallucinations, delusions, etc.), but rather by recognizing a pattern of change in the structure of an individual’s sense of self.5 This pattern, or Gestalt, suggests symptoms are not mutually independent bu…

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Precursors to the concept of schizophrenia (late 19th century concepts)
Precursors to the concept of schizophrenia (late 19th century concepts)

Bleuler reconceptualized Kraepelin’s original idea by adding to its scope of clinical illnesses which did not evolve into the kind of ‘terminal state’ of deterioration, considered by Kraepelin to be a defining feature of the disease.1 Bleuler introduced a fundamental dist…

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Definitions of schizophrenia

Definitions of schizophrenia
Definitions of schizophrenia
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Symptom dimensions (positive, negative, disorganization)
Symptom dimensions (positive, negative, disorganization)

While the three-dimensional model of positive, negative, and disorganization symptoms is the most popular, it has been criticized as too simplistic and more complex models have been proposed; however, there is no consensus as to the number and nature of dimensions necessa…

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Schizotaxia, schizotypy, and liability to schizophrenia
Schizotaxia, schizotypy, and liability to schizophrenia

The schizotypal personality traits broadly correspond to the positive, negative and disorganized dimensions observed in schizophrenia. The personality traits include positive (cognitive-perceptual), such as magical thinking, unusual perceptual experiences, ideas of refere…

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Developmental psychopathology and early emergence
Developmental psychopathology and early emergence

For individuals with psychotic spectrum disorders, including schizophrenia, multiple genetic liabilities (including diverse CNVs) and environmental exposures (biological and social) interact to alter neurodevelopmental trajectories.4,8,11

Abbreviations: CNV=copy number va…

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Schizophrenia or schizophrenias?
Schizophrenia or schizophrenias?

Neurodevelopmental aberrations in schizophrenia are largely mediated by numerous common variants of small effect, alongside CNVs with larger effect sizes. These CNVs have also been associated with conditions such as autism, ADHD, and bipolar disorder, supporting the conce…

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