ABSTRACT
Neuropsychology can justifiably regard as its legitimate domain the intervening steps between the abstract levels of representation—hallucinations, and delusions and “pure” psychological phenomena, e.g. memory and attention. No direct reference may be made to the brain provided two underlying assumptions are held, namely, that these psychological processes may become distorted by dysfunction at a lower level—in the brain—and that schizophrenia is the manifestation of just such a distortion. Peter McKenna and colleagues adopt the traditional approach to the psychology of schizophrenia: examining one mental function—memory—and comparing its potency in schizophrenics and normals. Kirsten Fleming et al. propose that the memory deficit in schizophrenia is a result of some higher-order control-mechanism disorder. The example of a cerebrovascular accident affecting the left hemisphere is compared with schizophrenia. The observation that disturbances in cognitive and motor function may precede the onset of schizophrenia has given much impetus to new theories concerning both aetiology and pathogenesis.
