[Executive control of language production in schizophrenia: a pilot neuropsychological study]. / Proizvol'naya regulyatsiya produktsii rechi pri shizofrenii: pilotnoe neiropsikhologicheskoe issledovanie.

OBJECTIVE: To test the general hypothesis about executive deficits in language production in schizophrenia as well as more specific hypothesis that this deficit would be more pronounced in the case of higher demand on executive functions. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Twenty-five patients with schizophrenia and twenty-seven healthy controls were asked to tell a story based on a series of pictures and then to give an oral composition on the given topic. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Schizophrenia patients, compared to controls, demonstrated poorer programming as well as shorter text and phrase length in both tasks. Oral composition on the given topic in patients was characterized by the presence of agrammatism, need for leading questions due to the difficulties of story plot generation as well as higher variance in syntactic complexity and text length. Therefore, the authors revealed executive deficit in language production, more pronounced in the task with less numerous external cues for planning and sequential text explication, in schizophrenia patients.

[Procognitive effects of transcranial magnetic stimulation in the light of neurocognitive deficit in schizophrenia]. / Prokognitivnye éffekty transkranial'noi magnitnoi stimuliatsii v svete problemy neirokognitivnogo defitsita pri shizofrenii.

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is a relatively new method of non-invasive therapy of mental and neurological diseases that has great potential of therapeutic and diagnostic application. In schizophrenia, TMS may exert a positive effect on cognitive deficit. However this issue remains open. The authors analyze recent studies focused on the dynamics of neurocognitive deficit in TMS therapy and consider clinical effects of TMS in schizophrenia. The analysis has shown that TMS is successfully implemented in treatment of auditory positive symptoms and studies on its effect on negative symptoms of schizophrenia are perspective. Procognitive effect was found in working memory domain, and partially in perception domain within the perception of faces and facial expressions. The data on regulative functions, attention, speech, and nondeclarative memory remains controversial. It has been concluded that further research is needed to clarify the place of TMS in schizophrenia therapy.

[The features of emotional processing in patients with depressive disorders]. / Osobennosti pererabotki émotsional'noi informatsii u bol'nykh s depressivnymi rasstroistvami.

AIM: To study neurocognitive symptoms in depressive disorders with the designation of their brain and psychological mechanisms. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Thirty-three patients diagnosed with depression and 33 healthy controls were studied using standardized neuropsychological tests and tests comprising emotiogenic stimuli. RESULTS: A neurocognitive deficit in patients with depression manifested as changes in speed of emotional processing and some cognitive functions. These patients demonstrate decreased attention to negative stimuli combined with decreased attention to positive stimuli. CONCLUSION: The abnormal processes of 'hot' cognition in patients with depressive disorders conceptualize such a core symptom of depression as anhedonia, which is a probable endophenotype of depression.

[Neuropsychological syndromes of non-psychotic mental disorders of youthful age].

Seventy male patients with non-psychotic mental disorders of youthful age (mean age 19.2±3.7), were studied using A.R. Luria neuropsychological syndrome analysis. Patients were stratified into 3 groups by diagnosis: cyclothymia (20 patients), pubertal decompensation of schizoid personality disorder (30 patients) and schizotypal personality disorder (20 patients). It has been shown that the neuropsychological changes indicate the dysfunction of the amygdale/temporal region in patients of the first group and frontal/thalamic/parietal connections in the patients of two other groups. There were interhemispheric differences between patients with personality disorder and schizotypal personality disorder: left hemisphere dysfunction was characteristic of schizotypal disorder and right hemisphere deficit (neurocognitive deficit) was found in patients with personality disorder.