Emozioni, umori e psicopatologia: Schizofrenia e depressione come disturbi affettivi

Phenomena of reality distortion such as delusions or hallucinations are indubitably among the most puzzling features of mental disorders. These are instances in which patients perceive the world in a different way with respect to healthy subjects and believe things that run counter common sense or are utterly unsupported by evidence. In this paper I argue that the phenomena of reality distortion exhibited by schizophrenic and depressed patients should be characterized as different forms of affective disturbance. More specifically, I maintain that these subjects fall prey to strong affective states - i.e. emotions or moods - that prompt them to regard some environmental stimuli as exhibiting a heightened or diminished degree of salience. As a consequence, they develop a peculiar experience of reality characterized by phenomena of hypersalience (too many things are relevant) or hyposalience (hardly anything is relevant). The argument is divided into three parts: first, I review some results from psychology about the influence of moods and emotions on human experience. In particular, I draw on the notions of core affect introduced by Russell (1980; 2003) and developed later by Barrett (2006), as well as on the notions of appraisal and concern (Frijda 1986). Second, I argue that the research on affect can be successfully applied to psychiatry and that it helps to make sense of experiences of reality distortion. Third, I discuss a few case-studies of patients affected by schizophrenia and depression and I argue that both disorders involve affective disturbances where salience is significantly altered.