Body Movement Imitation and Perspective Perception Among Psychiatric Patients

NCT ID: NCT01375894

Last Updated: 2012-01-02

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: UNKNOWN
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 60 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2012-03-31
• Study Completion Date: 2012-12-31

Brief Summary

The ability to understand the other's perspective and respond accordingly is the most important normal process of daily social life and is probably one of the foundations of human existence. This capability is reflected, inter alia, as an imitation - an important and effective form of learning which is very developed in humans. When we are required to imitate a particular movement, speed of response depends on the perspective of the movement. Imitative response is implemented faster when the movement is observed from first-person perspective, than if the motion is presented from the perspective of a third party.

While healthy individuals don't find it difficult to imitate, or to understand the other's emotion expression, there are psychiatric populations (such as autism and schizophrenia) who find it difficult to demonstrate these capabilities (Park, Matthews et al. 2008). Beyond these capabilities impairment, schizophrenic patients have difficulty distinguishing between their arm movements and those of a foreign hand and find it difficult to leave the boundaries of egocentric interpretation of reality and adopt the other's point of view. These behavioral disorders arise from defects in the network of mirror neurons (Buccino and Amore 2008; Langdon, Coltheart et al. 2010).

Therefore, the investigator expect that schizophrenic patients will not see a preference for movements that will be displayed in first-person perspective from the same movements that will be displayed from the perspective of a third party. Consequently, the investigator speculate that these subjects will not exhibit differences at imitating the response of which will be presented from different perspectives (Jackson, Meltzoff et (al. 2006.

Conditions

Schizophrenia; Depression

Study Design

• Allocation Method: NON_RANDOMIZED
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Primary Study Purpose: DIAGNOSTIC
• Blinding Strategy: NONE

Study Groups

depresive patients

30 patients suffering from depression

Group Type: ACTIVE_COMPARATOR

imitation assessment using the 5-dt "data glove".

Intervention Type: DEVICE

measuring the speed of the hand during imitation

Schizophrenia patients

30 Schizophrenia patients

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

imitation assessment using the 5-dt "data glove".

Intervention Type: DEVICE

measuring the speed of the hand during imitation

Interventions

imitation assessment using the 5-dt "data glove".

measuring the speed of the hand during imitation

Intervention Type: DEVICE

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

1. Men and women aged 20-65.

2. Subjects who met the criteria for diagnosis of major DSM-IV for schizophrenia or unipolar depression.

3. Subjects with normal or corrected vision.

4. Subjects who sign informed consent for their participation in the experiment

Exclusion Criteria

1. Patients with acute disorder, or an unstable patient. Especially neurological disorders or head injuries.

2. Drug Abuse in the past year.

3. Lack of jurisdiction, such as people with mental retardation or dementia.

4. assessed with high suicide risk.

5. patients which are Compulsory hospitalized.

6. Pregnant women

• Minimum Eligible Age: 20 Years
• Maximum Eligible Age: 65 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Sponsors

Shalvata Mental Health Center

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Responsibility Role: SPONSOR

Locations

Shalvata MHC

Hod HaSharon, , Israel

Countries

Israel

Central Contacts

Hilik Levkovitz, prof.

Role: CONTACT

ylevk@clalit.org.il

09-7478644

Facility Contacts

Hilik Levkovitz, prof.

Role: primary

ylevk@clalit.org.il

09-7478644

Other Identifiers

SHA-07-11

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id