Salaminios, George; (2021) Mentalizing the Self in Adolescence and its Links with Schizotypal Trait Expression. Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

Contemporary research suggests that clinical psychosis is distally linked with schizotypal trait expression and more proximally with the breakdown of psychological processes pertaining to mentalizing. Although previous findings are suggestive of a relationship between trait-vulnerability for psychosis and mentalizing difficulties, they involve adult participants either within or beyond the critical period of illness onset. To date, little is known about the process of mentalizing during the critical developmental period of adolescence or its associations with schizotypal trait dimensions. In a series of empirical studies, the current thesis used novel experimental tasks and self-report measures in samples of typically-developing young people to: (1) examine the nature of associations linking schizotypal trait dimensions in adolescence to disruptions in mentalizing processes involving both the understanding of the self and others; (2) further understand the processes that sustain self-awareness during adolescence by examining the effects that age, cognitive effort and emotional valence may exert on self- and reality-monitoring performance; and (3) prospectively assess the nature of the relation between mentalizing processes sustaining self- (self-monitoring) and other-awareness (ToM) from adolescence to young adulthood. Overall, the findings of the current thesis provide novel data suggesting that he expression of schizotypal traits that impede interpersonal communication with others in adolescence are associated with difficulties in self and other understanding. Regarding the development of psychological processes sustaining self-awareness, current data suggest that although both self- and reality-monitoring abilities may be established in pre-adolescent development, reality-monitoring capacities for emotionally-charged material may undergo further elaboration from adolescence to young adulthood. In addition, the data of the current thesis suggest that increased cognitive effort and emotional valence during memory encoding may respectively lead to self- and reality-monitoring confusions. Finally, the findings of the current thesis suggest that different types of self-monitoring misattributions in adolescence can prospectively predict specific patterns of ToM dysfunction at 5-year follow-up.

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