[Psychopathological study on schizophrenic autism through the paintings of a case of simple schizophrenia].

Abstract

Autism is the symptom which has the most specific features of schizophrenia. However, the content of pathological experience of the patients has not yet been clarified as it was never told by themselves. In the present study, a case of simple schizophrenia with a major symptom of autism is reported. Schizophrenic autism was studied psychopathologically by drawing tests. The analysis of drawings was summarized by the following characteristics. 1. The objects were drawn so as to be small at the center. The composition was further characterized by the overwhelmingly predominant empty space of its circumference, which we termed "reversed zoom lens effect". This seemed to show that the objects were isolated and removed from the patient. 2. The entire image of the theme was not drawn. 3. Lack of vitality was observed in all the drawings. On the basis of the above characteristics of these drawings and the clinical findings, the following were suggested as the pathology of the patient's experience: 1. The "reversed zoom lens composition" seen in the drawings suggested that the psychological distance between objects and the patient might be expanded. 2. The patient was alienated from the objective world to which he had once been accustomed as the object lacked vitality and familiarity. 3. The pathology of schizophrenic autism observed in the patient could be expressed as "alienation from objective experience." 4. It was considered that although akin to depersonalization, "alienation from objective experience" was the pathology characteristic of schizophrenia.