Department of Psychiatry Faculty

Education
B.A., 1969, Stanford University
M.A., 1972 University of California: Berkeley
Ph.D., 1975, Stanford University

Research Interest
To understand the neural mechanisms responsible for some of the symptoms of schizophrenia, we are conducting studies on the neuro-biological basis of self-monitoring failures in schizophrenia. These studies take as their premise the possibility that psychotic symptoms are ultimately related to failures to accurately monitor reality. This has been a recurrent theme in the literature that was suggested first by Irwin Feinberg (Feinberg 1978) and then by Chris Frith (Frith 1987). They simplified the concept of reality monitoring to "self" monitoring, which has helped us focus our studies.

Self-monitoring may be instantiated through the corollary discharge mechanism. Within the auditory system, corollary discharges from frontal lobes where speech and thoughts are generated prepare the auditory cortex in the temporal lobe for recognizing that what is sensed was self-generated. It has the effect of suppressing responsiveness to sensations that result from self-generated actions. A guiding thesis for my research is that many of the positive symptoms of schizophrenia result from a failure of the corollary discharge. This failure would be consistent with circuit-based models of brain dysfunction in schizophrenia that suggest disrupted connectivity between fronto-temporal brain regions and could result in auditory verbal hallucinations and underlie other positive symptoms of schizophrenia associated with failures of self-monitoring.

We use both EEG and fMRI to address questions about failures of the corollary discharge during self-initiated movements, speech and thoughts. Using fMRI, we find that patients with severe auditory hallucinations have less suppression of left middle temporal gyrus during talking than do patients with less severe hallucinations. Using EEG, we find that patients with delusions of alien control have less suppression of movement related sensations than patients without these odd beliefs. We are working to integrate EEG data, with exquisite temporal resolution, with fMRI data, with excellent spatial resolution.

Publications of Note
Mathalon DH, Faustman WO, Ford JM. N400 and automatic semantic processing abnormalities in patients with schizophrenia. Arch Gen Psychiatry 59:641-648, 2002.

Ford, JM, Gray, EM, Whitfield, SL, Turken, AU, Glover, G., Faustman, WO, Mathalon, DH. Acquiring and inhibiting pre-potent responses in schizophrenia: event related potentials and functional magnetic resonance imaging. Arch Gen Psychiatry 61:119-129, 2004.

Ford, JM, Mathalon, DH Electrophysiological evidence of corollary discharge dysfunction in schizophrenia during talking and thinking. Journal of Psychiatric Research 38:37-46, 2004.

Ford, JM, Gray, E, Faustman, W, Heinks, T, Mathalon, DH (2005). Reduced gamma-band coherence to distorted feedback during speech When what you say is not what you hear Int J Psychophysiol, 57:143-150.

Ford JM, Mathalon DH (2005): Corollary discharge dysfunction in schizophrenia: Can it explain auditory hallucinations? Int J Psychophysiol, 58:179-189.

Ford, JM, Johnson, MB, Whitfield, SL, Faustman, WO, Mathalon, DH (2005) Delayed hemodynamic responses in schizophrenia. NeuroImage 26: 922 - 931.

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