Associations between cognition in parents with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder and their 7-year old high-risk offspring

Abstract

Introduction

Neurocognitive and social cognitive impairments are central characteristics of schizophrenia and, to a lesser extent, of bipolar disorder. Birth cohorts and familial high risk studies have described cognitive impairments in subjects before onset of diagnosis as well as in children with increased genetic risk for development of the disorders.

Objectives

To our knowledge, this is the first study to investigate the correlations between neurocogntion and social cognition in parents and offspring simultaneously and with the same methodology. We will divide the parents into subgroups (cognitive impairment and good cognitive functioning) and use these subgroups to describe correlations with their offspring. Identifying associations between parents and offspring can add important clues to risk factors for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and, on the long-term, help the development of more effective and potentially preventive treatments.

Methods

This study is part of the Danish high risk and resilience study–VIA7. The VIA7 cohort consists of 522 children age 7 with zero, 1 or 2 parents diagnosed with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder and both of their biological parents. We assessed neurocognition and social cognition with a comprehensive test battery including: intelligence (RIST), executive functions (WAIS-IV, D-KEFS, CANTAB), verbal memory (TOMAL2), attention, emotion recognition, decision making and response control (CANTAB), theory of mind (animated triangles) and social perception (TASIT). Parental subgroups were based on the 95% CI of the controls (cognitive impairment < 95%CI and good cognitive functioning > 95% CI).

Results

Data analysis is ongoing and results will be presented at the conference.

Disclosure of interest

The authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.