Amotivation is regarded as a core negative symptom in patients with schizophrenia. There are currently no objective methods for assessing and measuring amotivation in the scientific literature, only a trend towards assessing motivation using effort-orientated, decision-making tasks. However, it remains inconclusive as to whether cognitive effort-avoidance in patients with schizophrenia can reflect their amotivation. Therefore, this study aimed to find out whether cognitive effort-avoidance in patients with schizophrenia can reflect their amotivation. In total, 28 patients with schizophrenia and 27 healthy controls were selected as participants. The demand selection task (DST) was adapted according to the feedback-based Guilty Knowledge Test (GKT) delayed response paradigm, which was combined with the mean amplitude of contingent negative variation (CNV), considered as the criterion of motivation. Our results showed that: (1) patients with schizophrenia showed a lower CNV amplitude for the target stimuli compared to the probe stimuli, whereas the control group showed the opposite trend (P < 0.05); (2) among patients with schizophrenia, the high cognitive effort-avoidance group showed a smaller CNV amplitude for the target stimuli compared to the probe stimuli, whereas the low cognitive effort avoidance group showed a higher CNV amplitude for the target stimuli compared to the probe stimuli; the opposite trend was observed in the control group (P < 0.05). These findings support the claim that CNV amplitude can be used as a criterion for detecting amotivation in patients with schizophrenia. Within the context of the DST, the high and low cognitive effort-avoidance of patients with schizophrenia can reflect their state of amotivation; patients with high cognitive effort-avoidance showed severe amotivation.

中文翻译：

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精神分裂症患者避免认知努力可以反映出动机：一项与事件相关的潜在研究。

在精神分裂症患者中，上乘被认为是核心的阴性症状。在科学文献中，目前没有客观的方法来评估和衡量动机，而只有使用以工作量为导向的决策任务来评估动机的趋势。但是，关于精神分裂症患者的避免认知努力是否可以反映其动机尚无定论。因此，本研究旨在探讨精神分裂症患者的避免认知努力是否可以反映其动机。总共选择了28名精神分裂症患者和27名健康对照作为参与者。根据基于反馈的有罪知识测验（GKT）延迟响应范例对需求选择任务（DST）进行了调整，它与或有负变化（CNV）的平均幅度相结合，被认为是动机的标准。我们的结果表明：（1）精神分裂症患者的目标刺激CNV振幅低于探针刺激，而对照组则相反（P <0.05）；（2）在精神分裂症患者中，避免认知努力的高组对目标刺激的CNV振幅比探针刺激小，而避免认知努力的低组对目标刺激的CNV振幅与探针刺激相比高。刺激 对照组观察到相反的趋势（P <0.05）。这些发现支持了CNV振幅可以用作检测精神分裂症患者动机的标准的主张。在DST的背景下，避免精神分裂症患者的高低认知努力可以反映出他们的动机状态。避免避免认知努力的患者表现出严重的动机。