Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2023 Dec 21:14:1280622.
doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1280622. eCollection 2023.

Agency in schizophrenia and autism: a systematic review

Denise P W Tan  1 , Olivia Carter  1 , Darcy-Rose Marshall  1 , Kelsey Perrykkad  2   3
Affiliations

Agency in schizophrenia and autism: a systematic review

Denise P W Tan et al. Front Psychol. .

Abstract

Introduction: Previous research suggests that altered experiences of agency are an underlying vulnerability in both schizophrenia and autism. Here, we explore agency as a potential transdiagnostic factor by conducting a systematic review of existing literature investigating agency in autism and schizophrenia individually and together.

Methods: Following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, we conducted three systematic searches on PsycINFO, Embase, Medline, PubMed and Web of Science to identify studies that investigated (1) agency in schizophrenia, (2) agency in autism, and (3) agency in both schizophrenia and autism.

Results: A total of 31 articles met eligibility criteria for inclusion and data extraction, with 24 measuring agency in schizophrenia, 7 investigating agency in autism, and no articles comparing the two. Results show that, compared to control populations, agency is significantly different in every identified schizophrenia study and generally not significantly different in autism.

Discussion: Importantly, we identified a lack of studies using common tasks and a disproportionate number of studies investigating different dimensions of agency across the two conditions, resulting in limited grounds for valid comparison.

Systematic review registration: Prospero, CRD42021273373.

Keywords: autism; judgment of agency; schizophrenia; sense of agency; transdiagnostic.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
PRISMA flow diagram representing the selection of studies included in review of agency in schizophrenia, autism and both populations (as at 26 July 2021).
Figure 2
Figure 2
PRISMA flow diagram summarizing update of studies included in review of agency in schizophrenia, autism and both populations between 2021 and 8 May 2023.
Figure 3
Figure 3
This figure provides an overview of the results indicating a disproportionately greater number of agency studies in schizophrenia than autism, with no studies investigating agency in both conditions. The results are further categorized into type of task, and whether they were implicit or explicit measures. The figure also reveals results of individual studies investigating whether agency was increased, decreased, different, or not different when comparing clinical and control groups.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

References

    1. American Psychiatric Association . (1952). DSM-I diagnostic and statistical manual: Mental disorders (1 ed.). Washington D.C.: American Psychiatric Association.
    1. American Psychiatric Association . (1968). DSM-II diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (2nd). Washington D.C.: American Psychiatric Association.
    1. American Psychiatric Association . (1981). DSM-III: Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders. Washington: APA.
    1. Balconi M. (2010). “Neuropsychology of the sense of agency: from consciousness to action” in Neuropsychology of the sense of agency: From consciousness to action (Springer-Verlag Publishing; ).
    1. Benítez-Burraco A., Adornetti I., Ferretti F., Progovac L. (2021). An evolutionary account of impairment of self in cognitive disorders. Cogn. Process. 24, 107–127. doi: 10.1007/s10339-022-01110-4, PMID: - DOI - PMC - PubMed

Publication types