NARRATIVE STORY-TELLING OF MANDARIN-SPEAKING PATIENTS WITH SCHIZOPHRENIA

Hsu-Ning, Graduate Institute of Linguistics, National Taiwan University

(Erasmus Mundus Master currently at Università di Pisa)

• Date(s) : 21/2/2012
• Heure / time : 14h00
• Organisateur / organiser : LPL

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The present study investigates the narrative story-telling of
Mandarin-speaking patients with schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is a
mental disease characterized by abnormalities in perception and
expression, with disorganized speech being one of its representative
characteristics. This study aims to provide a comprehensive
characterization of schizophrenic speech in Mandarin. Narrative story-
telling samples were collected from two groups of participants: the
normal control group (20 participants) and the schizophrenic group
(22 participants). Participants were asked to narrate three picture
stories: (1) the Couple Story, (2) the Old Man and the Dog Story, and
(3) the Frog Story. Narrative samples were analyzed using a Mandarin
version of Narrative Assessment Profile (NAP), a profile analysis
that was designed to evaluate discourse coherence in both typical and
atypical speakers (McCabe & Bliss, 2003). Eight dimensions of the
narrative performance were examined. They are topic maintenance,
event sequencing, reasonableness, referential skill, background
information, evaluation, conjunctive cohesion, and the narrative
pattern. In addition to the discourse level analysis, lexical choices
of specific connectives (causal connectives and contrastive
connectives) and verbal predicates (perceptual verbs, psych verbs,
and mental verbs) were computed. The study also includes an analysis
of character representation within narratives.
Schizophrenic narrators in this study had a significantly weaker
narrative performance in both discourse level and word level. Their
performance in six narrative dimensions (i.e. topic maintenance,
reasonableness, background information, evaluation, conjunctive
cohesion, and the narrative pattern) was significantly weaker.
However, they seemed to preserve an intact ability to identify basic
elements in narratives, performing comparably well in dimensions of
event sequencing and referential skill. Lexical analysis showed that
the schizophrenic group used less contrastive connectives and mental
verbs when telling their stories, echoing the findings of NAP.
Patients also demonstrated a more superficial character
representation in narratives, from which the diminishments of
language ability were related with the decline of Theory of Mind
(ToM) ability.

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