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Patients with Schizophrenia Do Not Preserve Automatic Grouping When Mentally Re-Grouping Figures: Shedding Light on an Ignored Difficulty

Looking at a pair of objects is easy when automatic grouping mechanisms bind these objects together, but visual exploration can also be more flexible. It is possible to mentally “re-group” two objects that are not only separate but belong to different pairs of objects. “Re-grouping” is in conflict w...

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Autores principales: Giersch, Anne, van Assche, Mitsouko, Capa, Rémi L., Marrer, Corinne, Gounot, Daniel
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Research Foundation 2012
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3421431/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22912621
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00274
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author Giersch, Anne
van Assche, Mitsouko
Capa, Rémi L.
Marrer, Corinne
Gounot, Daniel
author_facet Giersch, Anne
van Assche, Mitsouko
Capa, Rémi L.
Marrer, Corinne
Gounot, Daniel
author_sort Giersch, Anne
collection PubMed
description Looking at a pair of objects is easy when automatic grouping mechanisms bind these objects together, but visual exploration can also be more flexible. It is possible to mentally “re-group” two objects that are not only separate but belong to different pairs of objects. “Re-grouping” is in conflict with automatic grouping, since it entails a separation of each item from the set it belongs to. This ability appears to be impaired in patients with schizophrenia. Here we check if this impairment is selective, which would suggest a dissociation between grouping and “re-grouping,” or if it impacts on usual, automatic grouping, which would call for a better understanding of the interactions between automatic grouping and “re-grouping.” Sixteen outpatients with schizophrenia and healthy controls had to identify two identical and contiguous target figures within a display of circles and squares alternating around a fixation point. Eye-tracking was used to check central fixation. The target pair could be located in the same or separate hemifields. Identical figures were grouped by a connector (grouped automatically) or not (to be re-grouped). Attention modulation of automatic grouping was tested by manipulating the proportion of connected and unconnected targets, thus prompting subjects to focalize on either connected or unconnected pairs. Both groups were sensitive to automatic grouping in most conditions, but patients were unusually slowed down for connected targets while focalizing on unconnected pairs. In addition, this unusual effect occurred only when targets were presented within the same hemifield. Patients and controls differed on this asymmetry between within- and across-hemifield presentation, suggesting that patients with schizophrenia do not re-group figures in the same way as controls do. We discuss possible implications on how “re-grouping” ties in with ongoing, automatic perception in healthy volunteers.
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spelling pubmed-34214312012-08-21 Patients with Schizophrenia Do Not Preserve Automatic Grouping When Mentally Re-Grouping Figures: Shedding Light on an Ignored Difficulty Giersch, Anne van Assche, Mitsouko Capa, Rémi L. Marrer, Corinne Gounot, Daniel Front Psychol Psychology Looking at a pair of objects is easy when automatic grouping mechanisms bind these objects together, but visual exploration can also be more flexible. It is possible to mentally “re-group” two objects that are not only separate but belong to different pairs of objects. “Re-grouping” is in conflict with automatic grouping, since it entails a separation of each item from the set it belongs to. This ability appears to be impaired in patients with schizophrenia. Here we check if this impairment is selective, which would suggest a dissociation between grouping and “re-grouping,” or if it impacts on usual, automatic grouping, which would call for a better understanding of the interactions between automatic grouping and “re-grouping.” Sixteen outpatients with schizophrenia and healthy controls had to identify two identical and contiguous target figures within a display of circles and squares alternating around a fixation point. Eye-tracking was used to check central fixation. The target pair could be located in the same or separate hemifields. Identical figures were grouped by a connector (grouped automatically) or not (to be re-grouped). Attention modulation of automatic grouping was tested by manipulating the proportion of connected and unconnected targets, thus prompting subjects to focalize on either connected or unconnected pairs. Both groups were sensitive to automatic grouping in most conditions, but patients were unusually slowed down for connected targets while focalizing on unconnected pairs. In addition, this unusual effect occurred only when targets were presented within the same hemifield. Patients and controls differed on this asymmetry between within- and across-hemifield presentation, suggesting that patients with schizophrenia do not re-group figures in the same way as controls do. We discuss possible implications on how “re-grouping” ties in with ongoing, automatic perception in healthy volunteers. Frontiers Research Foundation 2012-08-17 /pmc/articles/PMC3421431/ /pubmed/22912621 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00274 Text en Copyright © 2012 Giersch, van Assche, Capa, Marrer and Gounot. http://www.frontiersin.org/licenseagreement This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in other forums, provided the original authors and source are credited and subject to any copyright notices concerning any third-party graphics etc.
spellingShingle Psychology
Giersch, Anne
van Assche, Mitsouko
Capa, Rémi L.
Marrer, Corinne
Gounot, Daniel
Patients with Schizophrenia Do Not Preserve Automatic Grouping When Mentally Re-Grouping Figures: Shedding Light on an Ignored Difficulty
title Patients with Schizophrenia Do Not Preserve Automatic Grouping When Mentally Re-Grouping Figures: Shedding Light on an Ignored Difficulty
title_full Patients with Schizophrenia Do Not Preserve Automatic Grouping When Mentally Re-Grouping Figures: Shedding Light on an Ignored Difficulty
title_fullStr Patients with Schizophrenia Do Not Preserve Automatic Grouping When Mentally Re-Grouping Figures: Shedding Light on an Ignored Difficulty
title_full_unstemmed Patients with Schizophrenia Do Not Preserve Automatic Grouping When Mentally Re-Grouping Figures: Shedding Light on an Ignored Difficulty
title_short Patients with Schizophrenia Do Not Preserve Automatic Grouping When Mentally Re-Grouping Figures: Shedding Light on an Ignored Difficulty
title_sort patients with schizophrenia do not preserve automatic grouping when mentally re-grouping figures: shedding light on an ignored difficulty
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3421431/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22912621
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00274
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