Anticipatory and consummatory anhedonia in individuals with schizotypal traits

Anhedonia is the reduced ability to experience pleasure emotion and has been considered a key symptom in schizophrenia spectrum disorders. However, little is known about the hedonic capacity and related neural basis for individuals prone to develop psychosis such as people with schizotypal personality traits. On the other hand, anhedonia is a complex, multidimensional construct that is important for social interaction and functioning in both healthy individuals and people with neuropsychiatric disorders. However, most measures of anhedonia are limited to clinical rating and self-report checklists that adopt a unitary concept. Increasing interest has emerged in the past decade to subdivide this construct into anticipatory and consummatory experience of pleasure. This book chapter will examine these two facets of anhedonia in individuals with schizotypal personality traits using a multi-pronged approach, including self-report questionnaires, computerized tests, and neuroscientific measures.