Interpersonal Communication Competence and Ability of Emotional Recognition among Patients with Schizophrenia

Background: Interpersonal communication competence impairments are widespread among patients with schizophrenia, with the majority experiencing ongoing difficulty in life functioning. One possible contributor to these difficulties may be deficit in emotion recognition with schizophrenic patients which are essential components of interpersonal communications competence. Emotion recognition is receptive emotional skills include the ability to accurately perceive emotion. Consequently, patients who have emotion recognition deficit often experience difficulty in interpersonal communications competence. Objective: Assess the level of interpersonal communication competence and the ability of emotional recognition among patients with schizophrenia. Settings: The study was conducted at EL-Maamoura Hospital for Psychiatric Medicine, in Alexandria, Egypt. Subjects: the data was collected from 270 outpatients with schizophrenia. Tools: three tools were used to collect the date; socio-demographic and clinical structured interview schedule, Interpersonal communication competence Scale (ICCS) and Bell-Lysaker Emotion Recognition Task (BLERT). Results: Findings of the present study revealed that 99.3% of the studied patients have low level of interpersonal communication competence and most of the studied patients have emotional recognition deficit in all emotion except happy emotion. Moreover, statistically positive significant correlations were found between overall interpersonal communication competence and overall emotional recognition among the studied subjects. (r=0.659, P<0.001). Conclusion: The present study concluded that, the studied subjects demonstrated low level of interpersonal communication competence, emotional recognition deficit and there was positive correlation between interpersonal communication competence and emotional recognition. Recommendations: Hospital policies should incorporate the routine clinical assessment of interpersonal communication competence and emotional recognition among patients with schizophrenia to consider appropriate psychiatric nursing care and intervention.