Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-5g6vh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-27T08:22:04.916Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The Scale for the Assessment of Negative Symptoms (SANS): Conceptual and Theoretical Foundations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 August 2018

Nancy C. Andreasen*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of Iowa College of Medicine, Iowa, USA

Extract

The Scale for the Assessment of Negative Symptoms (SANS) was the first instrument developed in order to provide for comprehensive assessment of negative symptoms in schizophrenia (Andreasen, 1982, 1983). It consists of five scales that evaluate five different aspects of negative symptoms: alogia, affective blunting, avolition-apathy, anhedonia-asociality, and attentional impairment. Each of these negative symptoms can be rated globally, but in addition detailed observations are made in order to achieve the global rating. It is complemented by a Scale for the Assessment of Positive Symptoms (SAPS), which permits detailed evaluation and global ratings of hallucinations, delusions, positive formal thought disorder and bizarre behaviour (Andreasen, 1984). Taken together, the two scales provide a comprehensive set of rating scales in order to measure the symptoms of schizophrenia and to assess their change over time.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1989 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Andreasen, N.C. (1979a) Affective flattening and the criteria for schizophrenia. American Journal of Psychiatry, 1366, 944947.Google Scholar
Andreasen, N.C. (1976b) The clinical assessment of thought, language, and communication: I. The definition of terms and assessment of their reliability. Archives of General Psychiatry, 36, 13151320.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Andreasen, N.C. (1979c) The clinical assessment of thought, language, and communication: II. Diagnostic significance. Archives of General Psychiatry, 36, 13251330.Google Scholar
Andreasen, N.C. (1982) Negative symptoms in schizophrenia: definition and reliability. Archives of General Psychiatry, 39, 784788.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Andreasen, N.C. (1983) The Scale for the Assessment of Negative Symptoms (SANS). Iowa City, Iowa: The University of Iowa.Google Scholar
Andreasen, N.C. (1984) The Scale for the Assessment of Positive Symptoms (SAPS). Iowa City, Iowa: The University of Iowa.Google Scholar
Andreasen, N.C., Alpert, M. & Martz, J. (1981) Acoustic analysis: an objective measure of affective flattening. Archives of General Psychiatry, 38, 281285.Google Scholar
Andreasen, N.C. & Grove, W.M. (1986) Thought, language, and communication in schizophrenia: diagnostic and prognostic significance. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 12, 348359.Google Scholar
Andreasen, N.C. & Olsen, S.A. Negative vs, positive schizophrenia: definition and validation. Archives of General Psychiatry, 39, 789794.Google Scholar
Berrios, G.E. (1985) Positive and negative symptoms and Jackson: a conceptual history. Archives of General Psychiatry, 42, 9597.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Humbert, M., Salvador, L., Segui, J., et al (1986) Estudio interfiabilidad version espanola evaluacion de sintomas positivos y negativos. Revista Departmento Psiquiatria Facultad de Medicina., University of Barcelona, 13, 2836.Google Scholar
Moscarelli, M., Maffei, C., & Cesano, B.M. (1987) An international perspective on the assessment of positive and negative symptoms in schizophrenia. American Journal of Psychiatry, 144, 15951598.Google Scholar
Ohta, T., Okazaki, Y. & Anzai, N. (1984) Reliability of the Japanese version of The Scale for the Assessment of Negative Symptoms (SANS). Japanese Journal of Psychiatry. 13, 9991010.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.