Open AccessHair cortisol, social support, personality traits, and clinical course: differences in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder
Author(s) -
Yang Fuzhong,
Hong Xiangfei,
Tao Jing,
Chen Yupeng,
Zhang Yanbo,
Xiao Hua
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
brain and behavior
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.915
H-Index - 41
ISSN - 2162-3279
DOI - 10.1002/brb3.2412
Subject(s) - bipolar disorder , schizophrenia (object oriented programming) , psychology , psychosocial , clinical psychology , psychiatry , social support , anxiety , mood , psychotherapist
Objective This study aimed to investigate the differences in the relationship between hair cortisol concentration (HCC) and psychosocial stress, social support, clinical features, clinical course, and outcome in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Methods A total of 109 schizophrenia patients, 93 bipolar disorder patients and 86 healthy controls between 18 and 60 years old were enrolled in the study. Linear regression and factor analysis were employed to examine and compare the relationship between HCC and childhood trauma, the number of stressful life events, the amount of social support in the three months before the hair cortisol assessment, clinical fearures, clinical course, and outcome in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Results HCC is significantly associated with clinical syndromes, including depression–anxiety factor of Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale in schizophrenia patients, and thought disorder in bipolar disorder patients. However, HCC is positively related to social support and personality traits only in schizophrenia patients but not in bipolar disorder patients. Factor analysis indicates schizophrenia and bipolar disorder share a very similar but somewhat different structure in terms of HCC, psychosocial stress, social support, clinical features, clinical course, and outcome. Conclusion Findings support that schizophrenia and bipolar disoder have a significant overlap in both clinical characteristics and enviromental risk factors. Aberrant HCC contributes to the complexity of clinical characteristics mainly in schizophrenia.