Chunk #28 — DIMENSIONS OF PSYCHOPATHOLOGY IN NEUROLEPTIC-NAÏVE PATIENTS WITH RECENT-ONSET SCHIZOPHRENIA — Relevance of FP in understanding the neurobiology of fronto-temporal dysfunction in schizophrenia
In a more recent study,[25] we used this landmark-based definition to study the FP gray matter volume in a sample of healthy subjects who were age-, sex-, and education- matched to neuroleptic-naïve, recent-onset schizophrenia subjects. One of the principal objectives of this study was to examine the relationship between FP volume and age in both healthy and schizophrenia subjects to examine evidence for a possible differential relationship between these variables across the samples. FP being ontogenetically and phylogenetically recent, its plasticity over prolonged periods of development may make it more vulnerable to age-related volumetric changes,[8485] thus making the study of the association between age and FP volume relevant. Our study revealed two novel findings: (1) we found an inverse relationship between FP gray volume and age in healthy subjects, in the absence of significant age-related changes in TBV, TGV, or TWV in the age span reported here (20-40 yrs). (2) The converse was true in the case of the schizophrenia sample, wherein, there was a selective lack of FP gray volume reduction with increasing age of the subjects, despite TBV, TGV, and TWV showing differences according to age.
