Understanding the relationship between apathy, cognition and functional outcome in schizophrenia: The significance of an ecological assessment

Abstract

In recent years there has been an increasing interest in understanding the role apathy plays in mediating the relationship between cognitive impairment and functional outcome. In general, most studies measure cognition with traditional cognitive tests that give explicit instructions and guide the participants toward generating a response. However, given that apathy is defined by a decrease in self-initiated behavior, it is crucial to evaluate cognition with ecological tasks that do not explicitly direct the patient's motivation to generate behaviors to assess the actual effect. This study investigated whether an ecological cognitive assessment (the Jansari Executive Function Assessment, JEF