Is the attentional dysfunction in schizotypy related to anxiety?

Two factors, 'anxiety-loaded' (AL) and 'perceptual-disorganization' (PD), emerged in a factor analysis of the Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire (SPQ). Sixty of the 219 participants performed a latent inhibition (LI) task. During the pre-exposure phase, one group was exposed to repeated non-reinforced presentations of an irrelevant stimulus and the other was not pre-exposed. In the subsequent test phase, learning was slower in the pre-exposed group than in the non-pre-exposed group. The LI effect was assessed, separately, as a function of SPQ. trait-anxiety sub-scale (TASS) of the State and Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), and AL and PD factors scores. LI was disrupted in participants with either high scores on SPQ, STAI, or the AL factor. A regression analysis indicated that both TASS and SPQ independently accounted for LI disruption in high schizotypals. but that the contribution of TASS was stronger. It was suggested that the anxiety component of schizotypy, more than the perceptual-disorganization (schizophrenia-like) component, accounts for the attentional dysfunction in high schizotypals. and for their greater than normal distraction by irrelevant stimuli. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.