A team led by psychology researcher Deanna Barch has received a $3.25 million grant from the National Institute of Mental Health, part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), to study the mechanisms underlying hallucinations and delusions in schizophrenia. Barch is a WashU professor of psychological and brain sciences in Arts & Sciences and the Gregory B. Couch Professor of Psychiatry at the School of Medicine.
Hallucinations and delusions are common and often deeply disruptive among people with schizophrenia. Severe episodes can increase the risk of self-harm and make it difficult for people to work, maintain relationships and manage daily life.
Until recently, there has been little research on the specific psychological, computational and neural mechanisms that contribute to the formation and persistence of hallucinations and delusions, Barch said.
Barch and her team — including researchers from the University of California, Irvine; the University of Chicago; the University of Minnesota Twin Cities; and the University of Maryland, Baltimore — will use advanced computational, psychometric and electrophysiological measures to identify the specific mental processes that can lead to these symptoms.
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