Cerebellar dysconnectivity in schizophrenia spectrum: task-based functional connectivity analysis and cognitive
Diana S M Rosales-Gurmendi1, Sadam Hussain1,2, Eduardo de Avila-Armenta1
1School of Engineering and Sciences, Tecnologico de Monterrey, Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Mexico.
Frontiers in Psychiatry
|April 20, 2026
Summary
Schizophrenia involves brain network changes, particularly in the cerebellum, impacting cognition. These cerebellar connectivity alterations track illness state, not just genetic risk, revealing distinct patient subtypes.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Psychiatry
- Cognitive Science
Background:
- Schizophrenia is a complex brain disorder characterized by network dysconnectivity.
- The precise links between neural alterations, cognitive deficits, and genetic predisposition in schizophrenia are not fully understood.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate brain network alterations in schizophrenia using functional MRI (fMRI).
- To examine the relationship between neural connectivity, cognitive performance, and genetic risk.
- To identify distinct patient subtypes based on clinical and cognitive profiles.
Main Methods:
- Multiscale graph-theoretic analysis of task-based fMRI during working memory tasks (N-back).
- Examination of schizophrenia patients (SCZ), unaffected siblings (SCZ-SIB), healthy controls (CON), and control siblings (CON-SIB).
- Unsupervised clustering to identify data-driven patient subtypes.
Main Results:
- Reduced cerebellum-sensorimotor and cerebellum-cingulo-opercular connectivity differentiated SCZ from CON.
- Dysconnectivity patterns were associated with clinical state (SCZ vs. SCZ-SIB) rather than familial risk (SCZ-SIB vs. CON-SIB).
- Three subtypes emerged: preserved verbal abilities, marked cognitive impairment, and working memory sparing, with cerebellar hypoconnectivity aligning with these profiles.
Conclusions:
- Cerebellar dysconnectivity in schizophrenia is detectable under moderate cognitive load and correlates with clinical status.
- These findings highlight cerebellar circuit alterations and their role in schizophrenia heterogeneity.
- The study advances circuit-based understanding of schizophrenia by linking neural, cognitive, and clinical features.
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