Harold Greene, University of Detroit Mercy professor of Psychology, and Vaibhav Diwadkar, Wayne State University professor in the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Neuroscience, received a $25,000 National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant to identify eye movement dysfunction in schizophrenia. Green and Diwadkar will serve as the principal investigators (PIs).
The grant will engage in research to develop and conduct novel tasks to determine the latency, how long before the eyes are moved, and velocity, how fast the eyes move, of eye movements in the vertical dimension measured as up or down. These experiments were motivated by the observations in healthy participants for whom eye movements along the vertical meridian are asymmetric, for example downward movement being faster than upward movement.
Schizophrenia has long been known for having persistent eye movement abnormalities along the horizontal meridian. To date, studies have only infrequently addressed the vertical meridian. The PIs hope that the study will enhance the diagnostic value and specificity of utilizing eye movements in schizophrenia and provide important markers for evaluating treatment efficacies in the condition.