O Comportamento Verbal do Esquizofrênico sob Múltiplas Condições de Controle

Abstract

This study aimed at functionally analyzing the verbal behavior of a person diagnosed with schizophrenia undergoing treatment in a specialized service. The participant is a female, diagnosed with simple schizophrenia, 27 years old, from the state of Bahia, single, incomplete elementary school, low social-economic status, and presenting a history of treatment in several institutions. To control the procedures, we used the design of multiple conditions with three main conditions: condition attention (A), condition alone (S), and condition control (C). Condition (A) was manipulated in four sub-conditions: (A1) attention, eye contact (inappropriate speech was followed by 10 seconds of eye contact); (A2) attention, physical contact (inappropriate speech was followed by 10 seconds of physical contact); (A3) attention, comment (inappropriate speech was followed by the comment It is difficult to understand when you talk like this ); and (A4) attention, task execution (appropriate speech was followed by social attention in the form of signs of approval); condition (S) was manipulated in two sub-conditions: (S1) alone, without demand (participant remained in the room in the absence of the researcher) and (S2) alone, with demand (participant remained in the room in the absence of the researcher, with demand); and condition (C) (participant remained in the room composed by reinforcers, in the presence of the researcher, who was writing on a sheet of paper). Under the conditions studied, we also aimed at observing some emotional behaviors of the participant, such as annoyance, anger, pleasure, elation, anxiety, sadness, and relief inferred from the intonation of her voice and her behavioral topography. The results demonstrated that the social attention manipulated under the different conditions controlled the participant s inappropriate speech, which may have worked as a motivational operation for the occurrence of her verbalization. They also demonstrated that under condition (A) there were more manifestations of emotional phenomena, and rage (attention, eye contact, and alone, without demands) was the most frequent emotion, followed by elation (attention, comment), whereas the least frequent emotions were pleasure and relief (attention, comment, and eye contact, respectively). These findings are discussed in terms of the implications of the effects of a motivational operation as a component for the functional analysis of the verbal behavior of the participant in the present investigation.