Abstract
Depressive Symptomatology and Attributional Style in Patients with Schizophrenia
Author(s): Pilar Sanjuán , David Fraguas , Alejandro Magallares , Jessica Merchán-NaranjoObjectives: The aim of the study was to evaluate the attributional styles and self-serving bias (SSB) in schizophrenic patients with depressive symptoms (schizophrenia and depressive symptoms [SD]) and without depressive symptoms (schizophrenia nondepressed [SND]), and control subjects (C). Methods: Forty-four outpatients with schizophrenia (twenty-two SD and twenty-two SND) and fifty gender- and age-matched C subjects completed the Attributional Style Questionnaire (ASQ). Attributional styles for positive and negative events were calculated by separately summing the responses for positive and negative items on the ASQ subscales (internality, stability, and globality). Results: For negative events, we found that patients with schizophrenia, independently of levels of depressive symptoms, made more internal, stable, and global attributions than C subjects. For positive events, both C subjects and SND patients made more internal, stable, and global attributions than SD patients. Moreover, C subjects and SND patients scored higher for positive situations than for negative situations. However, there were no differences between attributional styles for positive and negative situations among SD patients. For SSB, C subjects and SND patients had higher scores than SD patients. Conclusions: Among patients with schizophrenia, attributional style for positive events may distinguish between those patients with or without depressive symptoms. Our results highlight the importance of assessing depressive symptoms and attributional style in patients with schizophrenia.