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Auditory temporal processing in schizophrenia: High level rather than low level deficits?

Introduction: Patients with schizophrenia demonstrate a wide range of information processing deficits. Most recent studies argue in favour of high level deficits, including attention and context processing, whereas fewer studies have demonstrated deficits at earlier stages of processing, such as perceptual discrimination and organisation. This is the first study to investigate both high and low level processing, within a single paradigm, in the case of auditory temporal processing in schizophrenia. Methods: Patients with schizophrenia were compared to controls on a series of tasks involving three auditory temporal processes varying from low to higher level: (1) segregation of a complex sequence into component auditory streams; (2) detection of local temporal irregularities within a stream; (3) attentional focusing on one stream by the use of a cue preceding the complex sequence. Results: The lowest level of processing examined here--stream segregation--appeared to function equally well in patients as in controls. However, the higher level processes--irregularity detection and attentional focus--functioned in both groups, but less efficiently in patients with schizophrenia. Conclusions: Results demonstrate abnormal auditory temporal processing in schizophrenia. Abnormal performances only in Processes 2 and 3 support and hypothesis of higher level rather than lower level processing deficits in schizophrenia.