A screening questionnaire for schizotypal personality disorder (74 yes/no questions). The current standard for professionals. Not intended to use to diagnose, but a good starting point.
The SPQ has an internal reliability of .91 (excellent), test-retest reliability of .82 (good), convergent validity of .59-.81 (adequate-good), discriminant validity of .63 (adequate), and criterion validity of .68 (adequate). This means that this is overall an effective and high-quality resource. Source below the cut.
Raine, A. (1991). The SPQ: a scale for the assessment of schizotypal personality based on DSM-III-R criteria. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 17(4), 555–564. https://doi.org/10.1093/schbul/17.4.555 (PDF)
One of the DSM-5 criteria for StPD involves "odd speech." But what does this mean exactly?
Many individuals with StPD report feeling like they have difficulties communicating their feelings and expressing their emotions. (1)
When speaking, people with StPD have significantly more pauses, speak more slowly, have less fluctuation in pitch, and express less emotion compared to neurotypicals. This was detectable even when they only said a fraction of a word! (1)
Why is this the case?
People with StPD often struggle to understand and decode emotions in tone of voice. This may affect their ability to use tone of voice "properly" (in a way that aligns with neurotypical expectations) themselves. (2)
People with StPD were found to recall more idiosyncratic words and fewer semantically related words when prompted. This is called "atypical semantic cognition" and is associated with "eccentric speech and thinking". Basically, this means that people with StPD are more likely to think of seemingly unrelated words and concepts than connected ones, which contributes to speaking differently compared to neurotypicals. (3)
People with StPD have auditory processing abnormalities that are thought to affect their speech patterns, as well as language difficulties in general. (4)
Some good news:
These speech abnormalities are often detectable to other people. However, this did not affect whether the raters wanted to hear more from them, especially when the individuals with StPD are more self-aware and in touch with their own emotions. (1)
Further reading:
Reddit thread with examples of "odd thought and speech"
Reddit thread discussing over-elaborate speech
Tumblr post elaborating on odd metaphorical thinking
PsychCentral disorganized speech 101
References:
(1) Dickey, C. C., Vu, M. T., Voglmaier, M. M., Niznikiewicz, M. A., McCarley, R. W., & Panych, L. P. (2012). Prosodic abnormalities in schizotypal personality disorder. Schizophrenia Research, 142(1–3), 20–30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.schres.2012.09.006 (PDF)
(2) Wickline, V. B., Nowicki, S., Bollini, A. M., & Walker, E. F. (2011). Vocal and facial emotion decoding difficulties relating to social and thought problems: Highlighting schizotypal personality disorder. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 36(1), 59–77. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10919-011-0125-2 (PDF)
(3) Petersen, L. S., Vestergaard, M., Meisner, M. W., Foldager, M., & Simonsen, E. (2024). Atypical semantic cognition in schizotypal personality disorder and borderline personality disorder. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology, 46(3), 218–232. https://doi.org/10.1080/13803395.2024.2340813 (PAYWALLED; information from abstract)
(4) Dickey, C. C., Morocz, I. A., Niznikiewicz, M. A., Voglmaier, M., Toner, S., Khan, U., Dreusicke, M., Yoo, S., Shenton, M. E., & McCarley, R. W. (2008). Auditory processing abnormalities in schizotypal personality disorder: An fMRI experiment using tones of deviant pitch and duration. Schizophrenia Research, 103(1–3), 26–39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.schres.2008.04.041 (PDF)
Resource: Information and treatment (Magical thinking)
(7 practical ways to manage magical thinking)
An article that explains what magical thinking is and giving some suggestions for how to manage it. Also includes a video if you learn better that way.
