The Israeli High-risk Study: Some Critical Remarks

This article addresses a number of methodological weaknesses in the group comparison design of the Israeli High-Risk Study. It would seem that 25 years ago constraints of experimental design may have led the investigators to select as schizophrenic probands patients who today would no longer qualify for schizophrenic diagnosis according to DSM-III. In addition, a series of relevant dimensions (e.g. the course of the assumed schizophrenic process, family variables, life circumstances, and psychosocial factors) were not taken into account. For these reasons, many of the study's hypotheses and conclusions can be considered basically speculative, and it is suggested that many of the findings may be artifacts of the research design. Nor are there any evident grounds for the supposition that the differences between kibbutz and town children, in terms of the nature and severity of particular psychopathological problems, should be decisively ascribed to the differences in social framework and childrearing practices in the kibbutz and in town. The weight of many other variables, in particular intrafamily influences, is no less marked in the kibbutz setting than in town.