Facial recognition in schizophrenia

For most people recognizing a face is a natural and effortless process. Because of the importance of facial recognition a distinct and highly efficient brain system has developed for processing and utilizing facial information. In schizophrenia impairments in recognizing faces has been reported and such impairments may play a crucial role in poor social interactions in patients. Facial recognition is known to be particularly sensitive to inversion (being upside down) and a study of 57 people in the U.S. looked at facial recognition and inversion effects in people with and without schizophrenia. The researchers found that people with schizophrenia were significantly worse at recognising primitive line drawings of people's faces, either upside down or the right way up. However, they were as good at recognizing trees both ways up suggesting there was something specific to facial recognition which they had trouble with.

Chen, Yue ... [et al] - Inefficient face detection in schizophrenia Schizophrenia Bulletin 34(2), 367-374