Predicting Emotions Across Schizotypy Levels

Successfully navigating the social world requires making accurate predictions about others. Individual differences in emotion prediction–the ability to predict someone’s subsequent emotion given their current emotional state–can lead to variability in social success. Across three studies (N = 1,024) we found evidence that individuals with heightened schizotypy displayed worse emotion prediction accuracy. This difficulty with emotion prediction was associated with increased loneliness, diminished social support, and smaller social networks, partially mediating some of the social difficulties in individuals with heightened schizotypy. Individuals with heightened schizotypy showed disruptions to key sources of affective information, meaning they had less reliable information about how emotions work when making emotion predictions. Specifically, their own emotion experiences were less typical, and their perception of others’ emotions was less accurate. These findings highlight emotion prediction as a key social cognitive construct that should be considered in future research for individuals across the schizophrenia spectrum.