Age disorientation in chronic schizophrenia is associated with global intellectual impairment.

From a population of long-stay patients with a diagnosis of schizophrenia according to the St Louis criteria, a group of 21 patients with 'age disorientation' was selected, and compared on a series of tests of intellect and learning capacity with a matched control group of 21 schizophrenic patients without this feature. The age-disorientated patients demonstrated substantial impairments on tests of orientation and general knowledge, associational learning, the 'famous personality' test, tests of vocabulary and aphasia, Raven's matrices, the digit-symbol substitution test and the mental test score. We conclude that profound 'organic-type' psychological deficits (global impairment of intellectual function associated with temporal disorientation) undoubtedly occur in chronic schizophrenia. The findings on the 'famous personality' test and the Peabody vocabulary test did not exclude the possibility that such impairment arises early in life, at a time preceding the onset of the illness which leads to hospital admission.