Clarification of auditory hallucination phenomena based on Fernyhough's model using source monitoring task

Cognitivists have recently paid extensive attention to source monitoring deficit as an impairment in schizophrenic patients and is used in clarification of major symptoms including hallucination and delusion. Therefore, the present study aimed to explore the effects of source monitoring ability in auditory hallucination.

Methods and Materials: 

This causal-comparative study used availability sampling to select 40 schizophrenic patients and 21 individuals with major depression among those referred to or hospitalized in four psychiatric hospitals in Shiraz during June 2008-May 2009. Nineteen healthy individuals were used as the control group. After conducting supplementary interviews, they were tested using a sourcemonitoring task designed by the corresponding author. The data were statistically analyzed using signal detection theory (SDT). Response-sensitivity and response-bias scores were determined for each subject. The results have been explained in the light of the Fernyhogh’s re-expansion model (2004) and show the deficit in interactional relationship between source monitoring and inner speech.

Schizophrenic patients with current auditory hallucination scored the lowest in the visual sensitivity part of the source monitoring task which was not attributable to the response-bias andantipsychotic medication.

Our results confirmed the hypotheses stated in Fernyhough's re-expansion model about the mechanism of auditory hallucination.