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Schizophrenia Bulletin 2000 26(2):367-378;
© 2000 by Oxford University Press and the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center (MPRC)
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© Oxford University Press

Childhood Neuromotor Dysfunction in Schizophrenia Patients and Their Unaffected Siblings: A Prospective Cohort Study

Isabelle M. Rosso, M.A., Ph.D., Candidate in Psychology, Carrie E. Bearden, Ph.D., Postdoctoral Fellow in Child Psychiatry, J. Megginson Hollister, Ph.D., Research Assistant Professor, Timothy L. Gasperoni, M.A., Ph.D., Candidate in Psychology, Laura E. Sanchez, M.D., Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Trevor Hadley, Ph.D. and Tyrone D. Cannon, Ph.D., Staglin Family Professor of Psychology
Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia, PA
Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania
Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania
Department of Psychiatry, University of Utrecht Utrecht, The Netherlands
Department of Psychology, University of California Los Angeles, CA
Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry and Chief of the Center for Mental Health Policy Research, Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania
Psychiatry, and Human Genetics, Department of Psychology, University of California Los Angeles, CA

Reprint requests should be sent to Prof. T.D. Cannon, University of California, Los Angeles, Dept. of Psychology, 1285 Franz Hall, Box 951563, Los Angeles, CA 90095–1563.

Neuromotor dysfunction is a consistent finding in high-risk and archival studies of schizophrenia, but the sources of this dysfunction and its role in the developmental course of the disorder remain poorly understood. This study examined childhood motor predictors of adult psychiatric outcome in a birth cohort sample (72 patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder, 63 unaffected siblings, and 7,941 nonpsychiatric controls), evaluated prospectively with neurologic examinations at 8 months, 4 years, and 7 years of age. Deviance on motor coordination measures at 7 years was associated with both adult schizophrenia and unaffected sibling status, suggesting that a cofamilial (and perhaps genetic) factor underlies motor coordination deficits in schizophrenia. Unusual movements at ages 4 and 7 predicted adult schizophrenia but not unaffected sibling status, indicating that these deficits may be specific to those who will develop the clinical phenotype. None of the motor precursors were confined to patients with an early age at first treatment contact. Fetal hypoxia predicted unusual movements at 4 but not 7 years among the preschizophrenia subjects, suggesting neurodevelopmental dependence of its functional effects. Neither prenatal complications nor birth weight were associated with motor dysfunction in preschizophrenia subjects or their unaffected siblings at any age. Finally, preschizophrenia children did not show the expected developmental decline in unusual movements, perhaps reflecting aberrant functional maturation of cortical-subcortical pathways.

Keywords: Schizophrenia / motor skills / neurodevelopment / obstetric complications / precursors / birth cohort


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