Positive and Negative Symptoms in Schizophrenia Relate to Distinct Oscillatory Signatures of Sensory Gating

Oscillatory activity in neural populations and temporal synchronization within these populations are important mechanisms contributing to perception and cognition. In schizophrenia, perception and cognition are impaired. Aberrant gating of irrelevant sensory information, which has been related to altered oscillatory neural activity, presumably contributes to these impairments. However, the link between schizophrenia symptoms and sensory gating deficits, as reflected in oscillatory activity, is not clear. In this electroencephalography study, we used a paired-stimulus paradigm to investigate frequency-resolved oscillatory activity in 22 schizophrenia patients and 22 healthy controls. We found sensory gating deficits in patients compared to controls, as reflected in reduced gamma-band power and alpha-band phase synchrony difference between the first and the second auditory stimulus. We correlated these markers of neural activity with a five-factor model of the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale. Gamma-band power sensory gating was positively correlated with positive symptoms. Moreover, alpha-band phase synchrony sensory gating was negatively correlated with negative symptoms. A cluster analysis revealed three schizophrenia phenotypes, characterized by (i) aberrant gamma-band power and high positive symptoms, (ii) aberrant alpha-band phase synchrony, low positive, and low negative symptom scores or (iii) by intact sensory gating and high negative symptoms. Our study demonstrates that aberrant neural synchronization, as reflected in gamma-band power and alpha-band phase synchrony, relates to the schizophrenia psychopathology. Different schizophrenia phenotypes express distinct levels of positive and negative symptoms as well as varying degrees of aberrant oscillatory neural activity. Identifying the individual phenotype might improve therapeutic interventions in schizophrenia.