A prospective study of offspring of women with psychosis: visual dysfunction in early childhood predicts schizophrenia‐spectrum disorders in adulthood

Objective: Children with visual dysfunction have perinatal, neurological, visual‐perceptual and cognitive abnormalities, similar to schizophrenia patients. We prospectively investigated whether visual dysfunction in childhood selectively predicts adult schizophrenia‐spectrum disorders, and is related to childhood neurological abnormality. Method: Offspring of mothers with and without a history of psychosis were prospectively assessed with vision tests at 4 years, neurological examinations at 6 years, and interviews for psychiatric disorders at follow‐up (93% effective, n = 166) at 22 years. Results: In the total sample and high‐risk (HR) offspring, visual dysfunction at 4 years, and its severity, were associated only with schizophrenia‐spectrum disorders in adulthood, and with neurological abnormality at 6 years. Conclusion: Visual dysfunction at 4 years of age selectively predicts schizophrenia‐spectrum disorders in adulthood among HR offspring, this likely reflecting disturbed neurological development.