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The relation between antisaccade errors, fixation stability and prosaccade errors in schizophrenia

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Abstract

Whether antisaccade errors in schizophrenia are due to defects in implementing saccadic inhibition or difficulty in generating novel responses is uncertain. We investigated whether antisaccade errors were related to difficulty in inhibiting saccades when subjects were asked to maintain steady fixation, a situation that does not require a novel response. We examined the ocular motor data of 15 schizophrenia subjects and 16 healthy subjects. We assessed fixation in two situations: first, during the period before target onset during each saccadic trial, and second, during fixation trials that were interspersed with saccadic trials. We found that schizophrenia subjects had higher rates of fixation losses than control subjects in both situations. Second, both in healthy and schizophrenia subjects, antisaccade error rate was positively correlated with the frequency of fixation losses in the preparatory period of saccadic trials, but not with the frequency of fixation losses during fixation trials. Third, antisaccade errors were more likely to occur in trials with unstable fixation than in trials with stable fixation. Last, antisaccade error rate was also correlated with prosaccade error rate. We conclude that antisaccade errors are related to difficulties with implementing inhibitory control in the saccadic system. However, the finding of a correlation between the error rates for antisaccades and prosaccades suggests that this is not specifically concerned with inhibiting the automatic prosaccade, but a more general deficit in implementing goal-oriented behavior.

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Acknowledgments

DSM was supported by the National Institute for Mental Health (R01 MH67720), National Center for Research Resources (P41-RR14075), and the Mental Illness and Neuroscience Discovery (MIND) Institute (DOE-DE-FG02-99ER62764). J. J. S. B. was supported by CIHR grant MOP-81270, a Canada Research Chair, and a Senior Scholar award from the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departments of Neurology, Ophthalmology, and Visual Sciences, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada

    Jason J. S. Barton

  2. Department of Neurology, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Jason J. S. Barton

  3. Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Manisha Pandita, Katy Thakkar, Donald C. Goff & Dara S. Manoach

  4. Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Charlestown, MA, USA

    Manisha Pandita, Katy Thakkar & Dara S. Manoach

  5. Neuro-ophthalmology Section D, VGH Eye Care Center, 2550 Willow Street, Vancouver, BC, Canada, V5Z 3N9

    Jason J. S. Barton

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  1. Jason J. S. Barton
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  2. Manisha Pandita
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Correspondence to Jason J. S. Barton.

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Barton, J.J.S., Pandita, M., Thakkar, K. et al. The relation between antisaccade errors, fixation stability and prosaccade errors in schizophrenia. Exp Brain Res 186, 273–282 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-007-1235-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-007-1235-2

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