The concept of self is a fundamental characteristic of the human mind,and the alteration of self is thought to be a core deficit of schizophrenia.Previous studies have demonstrated that patients with schizophrenia are deficient in self-face recognition.Because self faces are not only self-related but also highly familiar,it is unclear whether such deficit arises from the breakdown of the self-awareness or the failure of recognizing the familiarity of self faces.Here we directly tested these two alternatives by instructing patients with schizophrenia to recognize the identity of a morphed face created by blending face features between any of two identities from the self face,a familiar face,and a novel face.We found that there was no association between the recognition of the self and the recognition of the familiarity,suggesting these two component processes are independent in schizophrenia.Further,patients with schizophrenia were significantly worse in recognizing the familiarity of faces than normal participants,whereas no difference in the sense of self was found between the two groups.Taken together,our finding suggests that it is the sense of familiarity,not the sense of self,that is selectively impaired in self-face recognition in schizophrenia.Thus,our study challenges the hypothesis that the deficit in self-face recognition in schizophrenia reflects the breakdown of self-awareness.
Why are some of us easily affected by the majority's action whereas others frequently make unique choices? In this behavioral genetic study on conformity,we designed a social episode to investigate the genetic and environmental origin of individual differences in conforming behavior during psychosocial development.Specifically,107 monozygotic(MZ) and 74 dizygotic(DZ) twin pairs(age 7-19) were asked to choose a pen from a group of pens either with the majority color or with the minority color.We found that the resemblance between MZ twins in selecting the pen with the majority color was not significantly higher than that between DZ twins,suggesting that individual differences in conformity are due almost exclusively to the environment.Moreover,biometric model fitting revealed that the shared environmental component played a sizable role in shaping individuals' conforming behavior,and the influence increased with age(from 16% to 26%).Taken together,our study suggests that the common family and cultural environment has important ramifications for conformity.
