This project will evaluate the adult outcomes and life histories of 24 offspring of 12 schizophrenic and 12 nonpsychotic mothers, who have been studied since their births in 1952-1953 and 1959-1960. The study was begun in 1952 to test the hypothesis that specific neurointegrative disorders in infancy predict vulnerability to later schizophrenia. Neurointegrative disorder, abbreviated as pandysmaturation (PDM), a transient dysregulation of gross motor, visual-motor and physical development, between birth and 2 years, was significantly related to maternal schizophrenia (X2, p less than .05), but not to obstetrical complications, SES, sex or ethnic background. The severity of PDM was significantly related to the blind, independent evaluations of psychiatric morbidity (including schizophrenia) at 10 years (X2, p less than .01). This project will put together all the information collected over the past 30 years and study the 24 life histories in depth. The infant data will be analyzed in detail and a standard system for scoring the severity of PDM will be developed. The prospective data on the evolution of personality, competence, adaptation and psychopathology from 2 years to 25 years will be analyzed (1) in relation to each infant's development profile and severity of PDM from birth to 2 years; and (2) in relation to each individual's life experiences, as observed at the time. If the predictions of vulnerability to schizophrenia which were based on infant development appear to have any validity, the results could only be suggestive with this size sample, but these data would permit one to pose more precise questions and design more definitive large-scale, short-term studies of high-risk infants. The long-term goal is to identify infants vulnerable to schizophrenia, so that the biological and psychological mechanisms of the dysmaturation may be studied in the first 2 years, when intervention may be most effective.
| Fish, Barbara; Kendler, Kenneth S (2005) Abnormal infant neurodevelopment predicts schizophrenia spectrum disorders. J Child Adolesc Psychopharmacol 15:348-61 |
| Carlson, Gabrielle A; Fish, Barbara (2005) Longitudinal course of schizophrenia spectrum symptoms in offspring of psychiatrically hospitalized mothers. J Child Adolesc Psychopharmacol 15:362-83 |
| Fish, B; Marcus, J; Hans, S L et al. (1992) Infants at risk for schizophrenia: sequelae of a genetic neurointegrative defect. A review and replication analysis of pandysmaturation in the Jerusalem Infant Development Study. Arch Gen Psychiatry 49:221-35 |
| Fish, B (1987) Infant predictors of the longitudinal course of schizophrenic development. Schizophr Bull 13:395-409 |
| Fish, B (1986) Antecedents of an acute schizophrenic break. J Am Acad Child Psychiatry 25:595-600 |
