The structure of schizophrenic incoherence
pp. 211-220
in: Manfred Spitzer, Michael A. Schwartz, Michael A. Schwartz (eds), Phenomenology, language & schizophrenia, Berlin, Springer, 1992Abstract
Speech in acute and chronic mental disorders was characterized well over one hundred years ago by Wilhelm Griesinger as temporally incoherent (Griesinger 1861). Later on, under the influence of Kraepelin (1913) and Bleuler (1911), the expression "Zerfahrenheit" (distractedness), currently used in German psychiatry, became dominant for speech disorders of patients suffering from "dementia praecox". In English speaking countries as well as in France the expression incoherence continues to be prevalent. At the present time the German translation of the DSM-III (1980) is reimporting this older expression.