Original ArticlePredicting Schizophrenia Patients’ Real-World Behavior with Specific Neuropsychological and Functional Capacity Measures
Section snippets
Subjects
Subjects were older schizophrenia outpatients enrolled in a longitudinal study of the course of cognitive and functional status. Seventy-eight subjects in this study were part of our previously published report (9). Exclusion criteria consisted of a primary DSM-IV (13) Axis I diagnosis other than schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder, Mini-Mental Status Examination score below 18, Wide Range Achievement Test (WRAT) reading grade equivalent of grade 6 or less, or any diagnoses in a patient’s
Results
In these analyses, 222 patients were assessed with all instruments and had case manager reports on the SLOF. Demographic and performance data are presented in Table 1.
Four factors emerged from the analysis and were named based on the theoretical constructs of the tests that had the highest loading. See Table 2 for the rotated factor loadings.
All three models of the outcomes had excellent fit, with the final model superior to the independence model (Table 3). In these models, there were no
Discussion
Cognitive impairment is a core feature of schizophrenia, which is associated with the functional disabilities that have proven resistant to treatment. Similar to our previous findings (9), with a smaller, but overlapping sample, this study reveals complex relationships between cognitive abilities and functional outcomes. By modeling different behaviors (work skills, interpersonal, community activities), the same cognitive skill may relate to performance directly or through its relationship with
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