Impairment of constructive memory in schizophrenia Caroline Huron a and Jean-Marie Danion b a CNRS UMR 7593, Pavillon Cle¤ rambault, Ho“ pital de la Salpe¤ trie' re, Paris and b Ho“ pitaux Universitaires de Strasbourg, INSERM Unite¤ 405, De¤ partement de Psychiatrie, Strasbourg, France Correspondence toJean-Marie Danion, Ho“ pitaux Universitaires de Strasbourg, INSERM Unite¤ 405, De¤ partementdePsychiatrie,1placedel’Ho“ pital 67091, Strasbourg Cedex, France Tel:+33388116037;fax:+33388115422;e-mail:jean-marie.danion@chru-strasbourg.fr Received16 February 2002; accepted 5 March 2002 Episodic memories are characterized by a specific state of awareness, conscious recollection, which allows subjects to mentally relive past events. They are not a literal reproduction of the past but instead depend on constructive processes. Patients with schizophrenia exhibit a specific impairment of conscious recollection. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of constructive processes into defective conscious recollection of patients with schizophrenia. An experiential approach to false recognition and related states of awareness was used. Thirty patients with schizophrenia, who were matched with 30 normal subjects, studied lists of words semantically related to a non-presented theme word (critical lure). On a recognition memory task with both previously presented words and non presented critical lures, they were asked to give Remember, Know or Guess responses to items that were recognized on the basis of conscious recollection, familiarity or guessing, respectively. Patients with schizophrenia recognized fewer studied words and critical lures than normal subjects. This deficit was restricted to memories associated with conscious recollection as indicated by a decrease in Remember responses, but not Know and Guess responses. Our results indicate that patients with schizophrenia exhibit an impaired conscious recollection, whether memories are true or false. They provide evidence that schizophrenia impairs the mere construction of conscious recollection. Int Clin Psychopharmacol 17:127–133 r 2002 Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Keywords: conscious recollection, episodic memory, false memory, schizophrenia INTRODUCTION Episodic memory is characterized by a specific state of awareness, conscious recollection, in which subjects mentally relive past events. Conscious recollection refers to the mental experience of perceptual, spatial, temporal, semantic, emotional or other details that are attributed to a past event (Johnson et al., 1993). Conscious recollection can be contrasted with a feeling of familiarity, a subjective experience of simply knowing that an event has occurred (Tulving, 1985). The distinction between these different states of awareness may be investigated using an experiential approach, in which conscious recollection and famil- iarity are operationally defined in terms of the ‘Remember–Know’ procedure (Tulving, 1985). During a recognition task, subjects are instructed to make a Remember response if recognition is accompanied by conscious recollection, that is, if recognition brings back to mind something they experienced when they learned the item (e.g. an association they thought of, an image they formed, or something of personal importance they were reminded of). They make a Know response if recognition is associated with feelings of familiarity in the absence of any conscious recollection. Episodic memories are not a literal reproduction of the past but instead depend on constructive processes. This constructivist view is strongly supported by evidence that episodic memories are sometimes prone to errors, distortions and illusion. False memories, that is memories for events that never happened, have illuminated the constructivist approach to episodic memory because they are accessible to experimental investigation. A widely used experimental procedure is that initially introduced by Deese (1959) and 0268-1315 r 2002 Lippincott Williams & Wilkins International Clinical Psychopharmacology 2002, Vol 17 No 3 127 International Clinical Psychopharmacology 2002, 17:127–133