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Updated: Dec 25, 2025

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Published on: June 15, 2011
Social cognition deficit and genetic vulnerability to schizophrenia in 22q11 deletion syndrome
Marianna Frascarelli1, Gaia Padovani1, Antonino Buzzanca1
1Dipartimento di Neuroscienze Umane, Sapienza Università di Roma, Rome, Italy.
Introduction:
22q11.2 microdeletion syndrome (22q11DS) is associated with a 25% risk of psychotic onset.
Materials And Methods:
The sample consist of 120 subjects: 39 schizophrenics (SCZ); 20 siblings of schizophrenic patients (SIB); 34 22q11DS non-psychotic patients (DEL); 17 22q11DS psychotic patients (DEL_scz); 30 control subjects (CS). Social cognition was evaluated with the awareness of social interference test. Intelligence Quotient (IQ) was calculated with Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale. TASIT (Awareness of Social Inference Test) performance was analyzed via MANOVA, including IQ as covariate.
Results:
Group and IQ showed significant effect (p < 0.001; p = 0.037). The only TASIT variables where IQ showed no effect were paradoxical sarcasm; sincerity; lie. In sincerity, CS group shows a better performance than both 22q11DS groups (p < 0.05). In paradoxical sarcasm and lie, CS group performed better than each clinical group (p < 0.05). Regarding lie, DEL group was worst also respect to SCZ group (p = 0.029).
Conclusions:
Our results show a specific social cognition deficit in 22q11DS and schizophrenia.
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