Typology of Relationship to Diseases and Socially Dangerous Activities of Patients with Schizophrenia in Relation to Psychological Characteristics

Abstract

The article presents an analytical justification for the relevance of studying the phenomenon of attitude to mental illness and committed socially dangerous acts (SDA) of patients with schizophrenia who are undergoing compulsory treatment in a psychiatric hospital. There is a noticeable lack of a qualitative psychological description of the holistic attitude to oneself phenomenon, to SDA and to the world around patients with schizophrenia with criminal history, as well as its role in the implementation of psychological support. The tasks of a specific empirical study aimed at studying the characteristics of attitude to the disease, socially dangerous acts, and psychological characteristics of schizophrenic patients who have committed SDA are presented. The following methods are used in the study: the author's version of a structured interview to determine the characteristics of the attitude to the disease and to the SDA; diagnostic battery for identifying the psychological characteristics of patients with schizophrenia. Processing the results of psychodiagnostic techniques and structured interviews was carried out using the method of frequency analysis, analysis of contingency tables, cluster analysis. The research sample consisted of 62 patients with schizophrenia who are in inpatient compulsory treatment in a specialized type of psychiatric hospital in Tomsk. The average age of the subjects was 24.3 ± 3.3 years old. As a result of the study, features of the attitude to the existing disease and to the perfect offense of schizophrenia patients were revealed, the relationship between the types of attitude to the disease and SDA with psychological characteristics of the studied patients were determined. The types of attitude towards the disease and SDA are defined: the first type is “Denial of both disease and SDA”, the second type is “Denial of disease and partial guilty plea in SDA”, the third type is “Awareness and illness, and SDA”, which characterize the holistic attitude of patients with schizophrenia with criminal history to the existing situation of the disease and to stay on compulsory treatment due to the commission of a socially dangerous act. The typology revealed in this study makes it possible to differentially approach the determination of the structure and targets of psychological correction effects during psychological support of compulsory treatment of patients with schizophrenia with criminal history.