A test of the schizophrenic's ability to process information in one or two sensory modes

Twenty-three schizophrenics, ten psychiatric controls, and 17 normal controls were used to test the hypothesis that schizophrenics suffer a deficit in their ability to integrate information from different sensory modes. The task involved identifying auditory, visual, or mixed (auditory and visual) patterns which had previously been equated in difficulty for normal subjects. Mean error scores were greatest for schizophrenics and least for normals with psychiatric controls in between. Moreover, the schizophrenics did equally well whether the task was visual, auditory, or mixed. Thus, schizophrenics showed no deficit specific to the synthesis of information from two different sensory modes.