Territorial behavior of schizophrenics. A phylogenetic approach

Utilizing Tinbergen's concept of increasing phenotypic adjustability on the evolutionary scale leading to man and the ethological concept of territoriality, five Territorial Behavior Scales were designed to reflect increasing levels of adaptive behavior in humans. Twenty recently admitted schizophrenics were studied in an active therapeutic milieu during 2 drug-free weeks, followed by 14 weeks of neuroleptic treatment. Four trained raters scored each patient weekly from 0 to 3 on each scale. Ward nursing staff independently rated social behavior and obtained measures reflecting psychomotor activation and autonomic arousal. Two major types of maladaptive behaviors were identified. The first, involving a breakdown of the ability to make any territorial distinctions in structuring social relationships, correlated directly with psychomotor activation as well as autonomic arousal and was a labile, i.e., treatment-responsive, behavior. The second, involving restrictive territoriality in which the individual occupies physical space to the exclusion of social interactions with others, was unrelated to autonomic arousal but correlated inversely with psychomotor activation and was a stable, i.e., treatment-resistant, behavior. Restrictive territoriality most characterized the total group throughout the study. Adaptive territorial behaviors expected in healthy humans were rare. Following treatment, hebephrenics showed the least favorable overall territorial profile. Untreated catatonics showed the highest levels of undifferentiated or chaotic territorial behavior, but with treatment their profile approached that of the paranoids, who were the least impaired. The data support the concept that two distinct pathological processes are involved in schizophrenia and that the three diagnostic subtypes of this syndrome are meaningful clinicopathological entities.