Bleuler suggested that fragmentation of thought, emotion and volition were the unifying feature of the disorders he termed schizophrenia. In this paper we review research seeking to measure some of the aspects of fragmentation related to the experience of the self and others described by Bleuler. We focus on work which uses the concept of metacognition to characterize and quantify alterations or decrements in the processes by which fragments or pieces of information are integrated into a coherent sense of self and others. We describe the rationale and support for one method for quantifying metacognition and its potential to study the fragmentation of a person's sense of themselves, others and the relative place of themselves and others in the larger human community. We summarize research using that method which suggests that deficits in metacognition commonly occur in schizophrenia and are related to basic neurobiological indices of brain functioning. We also present findings indicating that the capacity for metacognition in schizophrenia is positively related to a broad range of aspects of psychological and social functioning when measured concurrently and prospectively. Finally, we discuss the evolution and study of one therapy that targets metacognitive capacity, Metacognitive Reflection and Insight Therapy (MERIT) and its potential to treat fragmentation and promote recovery.

Contemporary researchers have tended to examine dysfunction among the lives of persons with schizophrenia as a matter of the impact of biological and social forces. While this has greatly advanced the knowledge base, any account of schizophrenia without a full consideration of the illness's first-person dimensions risks missing that schizophrenia is a disorder that interrupts the lives of people who must continue to struggle to find and create security and meaning. While literature from a range of sources has explored self-experience in schizophrenia, one barrier to the creation of a larger synthesis and application of this work is that it remains unclear whether, and to what degree, these differing views of self-experience are comparable with one another. To address this issue, this article reviews 6 different accounts of self-experience, a fundamental, first-person dimension of schizophrenia. The 6 are early psychiatry, existential psychiatry, psychoanalysis, phenomenology, psychosocial rehabilitation, and dialogical psychology. After comparing and contrasting the 6, we conclude that there is a wide-ranging, if general consensus, which suggests that many suffering from schizophrenia experience themselves as diminished relative to their former selves, ie, after onset they experience themselves as less able to engage the world effectively, which intensifies their anxieties in the face of everyday interactions. However, within this broad consensus, significant disagreements exist around issues such as whether these difficulties meaningfully predate the illness, how recovery is possible, and if so, under what conditions. In closing, we suggest a program of research to address these disagreements.

With ever more detailed models of the neurobiological and social systems out of which schizophrenia is born, it is possible to overlook how suffering persons actually experience their symptoms.This resource examines the experiences of persons who suffer from schizophrenia, providing a highly readable and humane examination of this common condition.