Self-other distinction and schizotypy: Affect sharing and alexithymia in the prediction of socially anxious and avoidant traits.

Social cognition may play a central role in many schizotypal personality characteristics, such as suspiciousness, constricted affect, social anxiety, and lack of close relationships. This study investigated how factors relevant to self-other distinction (i.e., emotion contagion and personal distress) were related to social schizotypal personality traits, in two experiments involving healthy young adults. Subclinical depressive symptoms, alexithymia, and obsessive-compulsive traits, were explored as potential mediators of the relationship between personal distress and schizotypy. Experiment 1 showed that high sadness contagion predicted personal distress, which in turn predicted cognitive disorganization. This relationship was mediated by low mood. Experiment 2 revealed that high personal distress predicted excessive social anxiety and ideas of reference, as well as obsessive-compulsive tendencies. Personal distress also predicted difficulty identifying feelings, an aspect of alexithymia that could develop as a result of difficulties in disentangling emotional experiences related to the self and others. However, it was difficulty describing feelings that predicted social anhedonia, constricted affect, and no close friends. While personal distress was a positive predictor of empathic concern, social anhedonia was a negative predictor. These findings suggest that personal distress and difficulty identifying feelings predict more anxious and disorganized aspects of schizotypy, as well as subclinical depressive and obsessive-compulsive symptoms. Future research should investigate whether this profile, which may be more closely related to low self-other distinction, contrasts with a more socially avoidant presentation, characterized by negative schizotypal traits such as social anhedonia and lower empathy. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).