Clinical marker of schizophrenia: Schizotypal personality in a university setting in Taza, Morocco

Schizotypal personality, formerly known as “latent schizophrenia”, is one of the personality disorders accepted as entities on the schizophrenia spectrum, leading us to believe that schizotypal personality can be considered a clinical marker of schizophrenia. Our work aims to estimate the prevalence of schizotypal disorder in a Moroccan student population, and to understand and characterize certain risk factors. The Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire developed by Raine is one of the most widely used diagnostic tools for the study of schizotypy. We present the results of the study of schizotypal personality disorder in a representative sample of 265 students enrolled in undergraduate studies at the polydisciplinary faculty of Taza (FPT) Morocco spanning from 1/03/2017 to 30/06/2017, of both sexes aged 18 to 23 years. The mean score on the Raine questionnaire is 29.81 ± 7.6, the upper and lower cut-off scores are 40/74 and 20/74, respectively, the male gender is the most predominant among schizotypal students with 78.26%. Furthermore, most of the schizotypal students lived alone or with their friends with a percentage of 91.31%. This factor suggesting family isolation is strongly associated with the onset of schizotypal disorder in our sample (risk 40.44; 95% CI [5.15–80.29]). The same results were found for the parameter 'family history of psychosis', which reflects the genetic component (risk 2.91; 95% CI [0.89–3.81]). Substance abuse would also be a strong risk factor for schizotypy. Our results suggest a strong exposure to environmental stresses in addition to a genetic predisposition in individuals selected for schizotypy. The epigenetic origin hypothesis is thus verified for our sample of university students.