ARTICLE OPEN The relationship between jumping to conclusions and social cognition in first-episode psychosis Luciana Díaz-Cutraro 1,2,3,20, Raquel López-Carrilero1,2,4,20, Helena García-Mieres2,4, Marta Ferrer-Quintero1,2,4,5, Marina Verdaguer- Rodriguez1,2, Ana Barajas 6,7,8, Eva Grasa 4,7,9, Esther Pousa 4,7,9, Ester Lorente4,10, María Luisa Barrigón4,11,12,13, Isabel Ruiz- Delgado14, Fermín González-Higueras15, Jordi Cid16, Laia Mas-Expósito6, Iluminada Corripio4,7,9, Irene Birulés 2,4, Trinidad Pélaez1,3, Ana Luengo4,10, Meritxell Beltran16, Pedro Torres-Hernández15, Carolina Palma-Sevillano3,17, Steffen Moritz18, Philippa Garety19, Spanish Metacognition Group* and Susana Ochoa 1,2,4 ✉ Jumping to conclusions (JTC) and impaired social cognition (SC) affect the decoding, processing, and use of social information by people with psychosis. However, the relationship between them had not been deeply explored within psychosis in general, and in first-episode psychosis (FEP) in particular. Our aim was to study the relationship between JTC and SC in a sample with FEP. We conducted a cross-sectional study with 121 patients with FEP, with measures to assess JTC (easy, hard, and salient probability tasks) and SC (emotional recognition, attributional style, and theory of mind). We performed Student’s t-test and logistic regression in order to analyse these associations.We found a statistically significant and consistent relationship of small-moderate effect size between JTC (all three tasks) and impaired emotional recognition. Also, our results suggest a relationship between JTC and internal 1234567890():,; attributions for negative events. Relationships between JTC and theory of mind were not found. These results highlight the importance of psychological treatments oriented to work on a hasty reasoning style and on improving processing of social information linked to emotional recognition and single-cause attributions. Schizophrenia (2022)8:39 ; https://doi.org/10.1038/s41537-022-00221-3 INTRODUCTION processes related to the management of social information, ‘Jumping to Conclusions’ (JTC) is a reasoning bias that consists of a coding, storage, recovery, and its application to social situa- tendency to make hasty decisions and judgments about an event tions23. SC is closely related to social and general functioning in without having enough information to obtain correct and people with psychosis, even to a greater extent than neurocogni- functional ideas or conclusions, resulting in the lack of considera- tion, hence providing independent and more ecological predic- tion of more flexible alternative explanations and consequently, tions of functioning24–27. It is a multifaceted construct, and incorrect reasoning1–3. People with psychosis show a pronounced through the SCOPE project28 a consensus has been generated postulating that it is composed of four subdomains: Emotional hasty decision-making style4–7 in different stages of the illness Processing (EP), Theory of Mind (ToM), Attributional Style (AS) and (including those with high risk and patients with symptomatic Social Perception (SP)28–30. EP consists of identifying and correctly remission), suggesting that it is a stable pattern8 and a cognitive using emotions; this domain also involves Emotion Recognition trait marker for psychosis5. Likewise, a higher prevalence of JTC is (ER). ToM evaluates the ability to infer mental states in other related to delusional symptomatology9,10, in people with psycho- people; AS refers to the ability to explain causes and make sense sis and in the general population11. In this sense, it is hypothesised of social interactions and situations, and SP consists of interpret- to be involved in the formation and maintenance of delusional ing social signals. A detailed and comprehensive review by beliefs4,5,12,13. Moreover, a greater predisposition to JTC predicts a Healey et al. (2016) showed that people with FEP present deficits worse prognosis for delusions4,14–16. Likewise, we know that JTC in in ER and ToM22. people with first episode psychosis (FEP) is associated with more The relationship between JTC and SC has not been deeply implausible delusional subtypes, such as control delusions and examined. Tripoli et al.31,32 reported that people with FEP who magical thinking17. Additionally, JTC has been associated with have JTC tend to have low EP; in contrast, there was no association lower neuropsychological functioning in psychosis18–21. between JTC and AS31. Regarding the relationship between JTC In the last decade the interest in the study of social cognition and ToM, Takeda33 and Woodward et al.34 did not find (SC) in FEP has been growing22. SC is a series of cognitive associations. These studies analyse the relationship with each 1 Etiopatogènia i tractament dels trastorns mentals greus (MERITT), Institut de Recerca Sant Joan de Déu, Esplugues de Llobregat, Barcelona, Spain. 2Parc Sanitari Sant Joan de Déu, Sant Boi de Llobregat, Barcelona, Spain. 3Psychology Department, FPCEE Blanquerna, Universitat Ramon Llull, Barcelona, Spain. 4Investigación Biomédica en Red de Salud Mental (CIBERSAM), Madrid, Spain. 5Social and Quantitative Psychology Department, University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain. 6Centre d’Higiene Mental Les Corts, Barcelona, Spain. 7Departament de Psicologia Clínica i de la Salut, Facultat de Psicologia, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain. 8‘Serra Húnter fellow’, Barcelona, Spain. 9 Department of Psychiatry, Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau, Institut d’Investigació Biomèdica-Sant Pau (IIB-Sant Pau), Barcelona, Spain. 10Psychiatry Service, Hospital Clínico Universitario de Valencia, Valencia, Spain. 11Servicio Andaluz de Salud, Area de Gestión Sanitaria Sur Granada, Motril, Spain. 12Department of Psychiatry, IIS-Fundación Jiménez Díaz Hospital, Madrid, Spain. 13Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Madrid, Spain. 14Unidad de Salud Mental Comunitaria Malaga Norte. UGC Salud Mental Carlos Haya, Servicio Andaluz de Salud, Málaga, Spain. 15Comunidad Terapéutica Jaén Servicio Andaluz de Salud, Jaén, Spain. 16Mental Health & Addiction Research Group, IdiBGi, Institut d’Assistencia Sanitària, Girona, Spain. 17Hospital de Mataró, Consorci Sanitari del Maresme, Barcelona, Spain. 18Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Medical Center Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany. 19Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King’s College London, London, UK. 20These authors contributed equally: Luciana Díaz- Cutraro, Raquel López-Carrilero. A full list of members and their affiliations appears in the Supplementary Information. ✉email: sochoa@sjd.es Published in partnership with the Schizophrenia International Research Society L. Díaz-Cutraro et al. 2 domain separately in populations with long-term schizophrenia Table 1. Description of sociodemographic and clinical variables of the and not with people first-episode psychosis33,35. On the other sample. hand, Grossman and Bowie27, assessed JTC and SP in people with FEP, and found that overconfidence in making social judgments N % resulted in insufficient or erroneous conclusions when processing social information. Therefore, further studies evaluating the Men 85 69.7 relationship between JTC and CS in a global and exploratory Women 37 30.3 manner are needed. Also, studies exploring this relationship at Mean SD different stages of psychosis are needed to know whether the Age 27.59 7.39 possible relationships are present and in the same way along the psychosis continuum. Understanding the relationship between Month of evolution of illness 25.57 7.22 JTC and SC could also be of great help for the development and Number of previous suicide attempts 1.18 0.39 personalisation of gold standard interventions that work together Number of hospitalisations 1.24 1.40 with reasoning biases in the social decision-making in patients Chlorpromazine equivalent dose 494.77 627.12 with psychosis. Our objective was to explore the relationship between JTC and PANSS positive 12.21 4.14 three domains of CS. Furthermore, we controlled for possible PANSS negative 14.64 6.00 confounders (estimated premorbid IQ, positive and depressive PANSS general 27.43 6.78 symptoms), and we explored the most relevant variables of social PANSS total 54.33 14.31 cognition that explain the presence of JTC. PDI total experiences 6.04 4.68 PDI distress 14.88 16.08 RESULTS PDI preoccupation 15.08 16.76 Socio-demographic and clinical characteristics PDI level of conviction 18.08 17.70 Table 1 shows the sociodemographic and clinical characteristics of GAF Total 61.26 12.71 1234567890():,; the sample. The percentage of women is 30.30%, and that of men PANSS Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale, PDI Peters Delusions is 69.7%. The mean age is 27.59 (SD = 7.39), the months of illness Inventory, GAF Global assessment of functioning. The Global Assessment are 25.57 (SD = 7.22), and the number of previous suicide of Functioning (GAF) scale measures the extent to which a person’s attempts is 1.18 (SD = 0.39). symptoms affect functioning in different spheres of daily life, with a scale from 0 to 10018,76. Participants who did JTC on Beads Task Table 2 shows the percentages of participants who jump to conclusions and those who do not, in each of the beads tasks. A total of 29.8% (n = 36) of the individuals jumped to conclusions in Table 2. Percentages of participants who jump to conclusions and Task 1, 14.0% (n = 17) in Task 2, and 15.7% (n = 19) in Task 3. those who do not in each bead task. Task 1 - 85%:15% Task 2 - 60%:40% Task 3 - Affective The relationship between JTC and SC 60%:40% Table 3 shows the relationship between those who perform JTC JTC Non-JTC JTC Non-JTC JTC Non-JTC and who do not and SC variables. Firstly, people who jumped to conclusions in all three tasks scored lower in ER than those who N % N % N % N % N % N % did not. The easiest JTC task (85:15) showed statistically significant differences on SC measures with small effect sizes, while the 60:40 36 29.8 85 70.2 17 14 104 86 19 15.7 102 84.3 task and the salient task showed medium effect sizes. Regarding ToM, we have found no relationships with JTC. Considering AS, we First, we found an association between JTC and ER, and between found mixed findings. Persons who JTC make more internalized JTC and some aspects of AS (almost with internal attribution of attributions for negative events, in task 1 and 3, than people who negative events), but there was no evidence of a relationship do not JTC. Likewise, we found a relationship between JTC and between JTC and ToM. The effect sizes of the relationships low externalized bias in task 1, and with situational attribution of between JTC and ER were greater in the most discriminating tasks negative events in task 3. (tasks of the proportion 60:40 with beads and salient variant); additionally, ER explains the variance of JTC in the three tasks. SC and confounding variables explaining JTC Regarding emotion recognition, we found that patients who In order to examine the effect of depression (BDI), positive jump to conclusions have more difficulty recognising emotions symptoms (PANSS) and IQ (WAIS) as confounders, a logistic than those that do not present the JTC bias, even after controlling regression analysis was performed including these variables to the for mood and positive symptoms. These results highlight the need previous analysis. Table 4 shows a logistic regression analysis for improving reasoning judgments that are involved in ER in where only statistically significant variables were included. JTC in people with FEP. The results are consistent with the previous Task 1 was explained by ER and AS (Internal attributions for findings by Tripoli et al.31,32 where it was observed that patients negative events). In the Task 2, JTC was explained by ER. Finally, in with FEP who displayed JTC recognised worse emotions globally the case of Task 3, JTC was explained by ER and IQ. compared with controls, which is especially important because few psychological treatments intervene in both constructs36. In this line, psychological interventions such as metacognitive DISCUSSION training for psychosis (MCT) would be recommended, because it Our aim was to examine the relationship between JTC and works with specific modules about ER and the importance of different domains of SC in people with FEP, and to explore what of making judgments based on the search of sufficient evidence to these components of social cognition explain the presence of do that37,38. The MCT invites participants to “sow the seed of JTC. We found several results that merit discussion in this study. doubt” in the inflexible thinking present in psychosis39. Schizophrenia (2022) 39 Published in partnership with the Schizophrenia International Research Society L. Díaz-Cutraro et al. 3 Table 3. Comparison of people who jumped to conclusions or not, regarding attributional style, emotional recognition, and ToM, using Student’s t-tests. JTC 85:15 JTC 60:40 JTC 60:40 salient task Mean SD P-value Mean SD P-value Mean SD P-value (Effect size) (Effect size) (Effect size) ER Emotional recognition test No JTC 17.81 1.58 0.042 (0.388)* 17.74 1.67 0.031 (0.539)** 17.82 1.54 0.017 (0.721)** JTC 17.11 2.00 16.76 1.95 16.42 2.27 ToM Hinting task No JTC 4.81 1.09 0.308 (0.202) 4.76 1.10 0.703 (0.092) 4.79 1.06 0.255 (0.258) JTC 4.58 1.18 4.65 1.27 4.47 1.39 Attributional style Internal attribution of No JTC 7.14 3.40 0.745 (0.064) 7.05 3.43 0.202 (0.331) 7.12 3.30 0.522 (0.152) positive event JTC 7.37 3.74 8.25 3.80 7.72 4.51 Internal attribution of No JTC 5.96 3.65 0.034 (0.425)* 6.21 3.62 0.103 (0.401) 6.12 3.55 0.029 (0.509)** negative event JTC 7.57 3.93 7.88 4.63 8.22 4.63 Personal attribution of No JTC 4.94 3.52 0.225 (0.255) 4.67 3.42 0.822 (0.063) 4.71 3.41 0.907 (0.029) positive event JTC 4.11 2.96 4.88 3.16 4.61 3.26 Personal attribution of No JTC 6.77 3.66 0.125 (0.313) 6.52 3.59 0.547 (0.145) 6.50 3.50 0.672 (0.100) negative event JTC 5.66 3.41 5.94 3.84 6.11 4.25 Situational attribution of No JTC 3.92 3.33 0.516 (0.1126) 4.27 3.51 0.077 (0.514) 4.16 3.45 0.423 (0.204) positive event JTC 4.37 3.79 2.63 2.83 3.44 3.58 Situational attribution of No JTC 3.23 3.32 0.389 (0.176) 3.21 3.35 0.191 (0.386) 3.33 3.38 0.004 (0.636)** negative event JTC 2.66 3.14 2.06 2.54 1.56 2.01 Externalised bias No JTC 1.18 4.06 0.042 (0.388)* 0.83 3.76 0.658 (0.112) 1.00 3.82 0.124 (0.404) JTC −0.20 2.95 0.38 4.22 −0.50 3.59 Personalised bias No JTC 1.27 0.68 0.929 (0.028) 1.23 0.67 0.073 (0.470) 1.24 0.66 0.184 (0.315) JTC 1.29 0.71 1.56 0.73 1.47 0.79 *Low effect size. **Medium to large effect sizes. Bold values identify statistical significance. Table 4. Logistic regression model of social cognition and clinical variables associated with jumping to conclusions. Task 1 - 85%:15% Task 2 - 60%:40% Task 3 - Salient 60%:40% B SE p-value B SE p-value B SE p- value Emotional recognition Emotional recognition test −0.329 0.134 0.014 −0.472 0.171 0.006 −0.691 0.228 0.002 Attributional style Internal attribution for negative events 0.13 0.061 0.031 - - - - - 0.058 Situational attribution for negative events - - - - - - - - 0.167 Externalizing bias - - 0.539 - - - - - - Clinical and IQ variables Depressive symptoms - - 0.096 - - 0.513 - - 0.358 Positive symptoms - - 0.864 - - 0.899 - - 0.171 Estimated premorbid IQ - - 0.107 - - 0.083 −0.061 0.022 0.005 Model R2 Nagelkerke 0.146 0.131 0.426 Bold values identify statistical significance. Furthermore, it could be suggested the indication of this necessarily interpret the mental states of others more poorly than intervention, because the improvements at the end of the MCT people who do not JTC. Our findings are consistent with previous are maintained in the follow-up40–42. This is a “sleeper” effect of findings by Woodward et al.32. Using factor analysis, these authors MCT, which could have an important effect in the future of patients found that JTC loaded in a different neurocognitive factor than with early stages of the psychosis and could prevent deficits in ToM. Likewise, Takeda et al.31 did not find a relationship between social information processing in more advanced stages of JTC and ToM. However, it should be noted that they found a psychosis41. In conclusion, for patients with FEP who do JTC, it relationship between decision confidence and ToM. Patients who seems relevant to us to recommend early psychological treatments tended to make interpretations with a high level of confidence focused on modifying reasoning biases and improving the failed to make appropriate interpretations of the mental states of recognition of facial emotions. the others. There are methodological differences between our Considering ToM, we did not find a relationship between JTC study and theirs, as we used different measures for SC, and we did and ToM. That is, those people who have the JTC bias do not not measure confidence in the decision. Furthermore, their sample Published in partnership with the Schizophrenia International Research Society Schizophrenia (2022) 39 L. Díaz-Cutraro et al. 4 consisted in participants with long-term schizophrenia. Further studies which may have led to a floor effect; one possible studies should assess the relationship between ToM and JTC explanation could be related with the early stage of illness of the considering them as independent mechanisms. sample (noting that some reports have found lower levels of JTC Regarding Attributional style, our results suggest that people in the early stages than in chronic stages)18. As an inclusion who do JTC easily (in task 1) and/or in decisions more influenced criterion was that the subject had positive symptoms, the results by social content (task 3) would tend to make unidirectional are generalizable only to the population with more psychotic attributions either to themselves or to situations in a negative way, symptoms or those who are more similar to the population that even after controlling for mood, positive symptoms, and IQ. In we can attend in specific services for the rehabilitation of people order to discuss the findings with previous literature, as we have with FEP. not found studies that previously analysed this relationship in FEP, Future studies should analyse the possible mediating effect we consider the results of other studies on psychotic spectrum between JTC and SC of more comprehensive neuropsychological disorders in more advanced stages of the disorder, or of studies variables (memory, attention, perception, executive func- based on AS only. Based on what we found, we infer those tions)19,21 and insight51,52. Studies that include these domains patients with FEP who make hasty decisions tend to assign the as mediators can help to deepen the understanding of the nature cause of negative events to themselves or to situations. In contrast of the relationship between JTC and the SC. For this part, to our findings, Merrin et al.43 observed that JTC, in patients with longitudinal and comparative studies on JTC and SC in different persecutory delusions, is related to the greater presence of an stages of psychosis could be beneficial for personalised external/personalising bias. On the other hand, Moritz et al. found treatments according to the stage of illness. Similarly, studies no relationship between JTC and AS35,44,45, although it should be involving more complex social cognition measurements may taken into account that Moritz et al.35,44 measure AS in a different shed light on actual results. way than we do, and this may influence the results. However, they As a conclusion, our results suggest that patients who are quick found a contrast with previous findings highlighting that patients to draw conclusions have impairment in processing social with paranoia tend to blame others for negative events9, information, which involves poorer ER, and an AS based on suggesting that patients with schizophrenia displayed a ‘depres- unilateral attributions oriented to a negative internalisation for the sive realism’ (no further credit attributed to positive events than causes of events. These findings may suggest common psycho- they blame themselves for negative events). This could be pathological constructs between JTC, ER, and one-sided self- explained by the theory of Trower and Chadwick46 of the ‘bad negative attributions that can be worked on in psychological me/poor me’ of paranoia47 where the ‘poor me’ is characterised by interventions that include them in their therapeutic objectives. seeing themselves as an innocent victim while condemning others Given that our sample in this study represents a population with for the persecution. In this vein, the attributional judgments of the ongoing acute symptoms, this finding is of special importance for patients could be labile, as they are able to go from being those health services designed for interventions in the early personalising/external to blaming themselves after experiences of failure48. Several psychological interventions address work with phases of psychosis, such as rehabilitation services, first episode JTC and AS, such us the MCT and SlowMo therapy49. This last programmes for psychotic patients, or inpatient services. There- intervention is an innovated blended digital intervention targeting fore, psychological interventions that address hasty reasoning reasoning to help reduce paranoia and has been found to be a style in patients with psychosis should consider exercises and highly engaging treatment option49,50. This treatment merges the clinical examples that help them improve processing social benefits and the attraction of the new technologies with a focus information and considering multiple causes for social and non- on key mechanisms, such as JTC and AS, that play a central role in social events, and a correct recognition of emotions in others. psychotic symptoms. Taking into account the confounders that we considered, METHODS neither depressive symptoms nor negative symptoms explained the presence of JTC, although IQ in JTC task 3 did. This finding is Study design related to previous studies such as Tripoli et al.21 and Gonzalez A cross-sectional study was performed based on baseline data from a et al.19 However, Ochoa et al.18 and Garety et al.43 did not find a large multicentre clinical trial40. The study was recorded in Clinical Trials (Identifier: NCT02340559). relationship between JTC and IQ, although it was found with other neuropsychological variables. Tripoli et al.21 found that JTC may be associated with psychosis through IQ. However, only JTC Sample, inclusion, and exclusion criteria would be an indicator of good/bad prognosis in professional The sample was composed of 121 patients with a FEP53 recruited at one of status (Andreou et al. 2014), in delusional symptomatology4, in the nine participating mental health centres: Servicio Andaluz of Jaén, hospitalizations and compulsory admissions3. In our results, IQ Málaga and Motril (Granada), Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau only explained the presence of JTC in task 3 (one of the two tasks (Barcelona), Hospital Clínico Universitario de Valencia, Centro de Higiene considered difficult) and we suggest that further studies should Mental de les Corts (Barcelona), Salut Mental Parc Taulí (Sabadell), Institut d ´Assistència Sanitària Girona, and the coordinating centre Parc Sanitari Sant be conducted that consider neuropsychological variables as Joan de Déu (Sant Boi). mediating variables in the relationship between JTC and CS to Regarding the proposal of Breitborde et al.53 inclusion criteria were: (1) study the role of IQ in greater depth in this population. a diagnosis of schizophrenia, psychotic disorder not otherwise specified, Some limitations should be considered in the methods of this delusional disorder, schizoaffective disorder, brief psychotic disorder, or study. Regarding measurement in the JTC assessment, we did not schizophreniform disorder (according to DSM-IV-TR); (2) < 5 years from the measure confidence in decisions. Considering the measurement of onset of symptoms; (3) PANSS scores in delusions, grandiosity, or SC, the task used to evaluate EP assesses a basic level of ER, suspiciousness of ≥ 4 during the previous year; and (4) age between 17 making it necessary to include more complex measures in future and 45 years. Exclusion criteria were: (1) a traumatic brain injury, studies. Depressive symptoms did not modify the results of JTC dementia, or intellectual disability (premorbid IQ ≤ 70; (2) substance and social cognition, however further studies should consider dependence; and (3) PANSS scores in hostile and uncooperativeness of ≥ using a more specific scale for the assessment of depressive 5 and in suspiciousness ≥ 6. symptoms in psychosis such as Calgary Depression Scale. Regarding the sample, another limitation is that we did not have Assessment healthy controls as a comparison group. It should be considered, Considering the assessment, we included a sociodemographic question- the low percentage of people that JTC in comparison with other naire which collects relevant information regarding the description of the Schizophrenia (2022) 39 Published in partnership with the Schizophrenia International Research Society L. Díaz-Cutraro et al. 5 samples. We also included different questionnaires regarding JTC, SC, and positive events, the personal attribution for negative events, the situational clinical measures. attribution for positive events and, the situational attribution of negative events. Social perception (SP) has not been evaluated because we have not found a validated tool in Spanish at the time of this study. Assessment of jumping to conclusions bias JTC was assessed with the computer version of the beads task54,55 in which the participants have to make the decision from which jar the extracted Clinical assessment beads come from. All tasks have an introductory part, in which the two jars The Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS)64,65 was used for the (in the case of the 85:15 and 60:40 beads task)/studies (in the case of the assessment of psychotic symptoms. The PANSS is a semi-structured salient task) are presented, and an instructional part, in which it is interview that assesses positive, negative, and general symptoms of people explained to the participant what he/she must do. The first part is similar in with psychosis in a total of 30 items. Delusional ideas were assessed with the explanations of the three tasks, here is a quote from one of them, in the Peters Delusions Inventory 2166,67. The PDI-21 is a self-report designed this case from the salient version: “Imagine that we have conducted two for assessing delusional ideas, which is composed of a total of 21 items studies on a person very similar to you. The study with majority negative with a dichotomous response format (yes/no). The total score is the sum of gave 60 negative comments and 40 positive comments. The study with positive responses to each item, yielding a maximum score of 21 points. majority positive gave 60 positive comments and 40 negative comments. The higher the score, the greater the delusional ideas or proneness to The positive comments are words like kind, decent, warm. Negative paranoia. In addition, for each of the items, there are three subscales that comments are words like vain, cold, greedy”. The instructions according to measure level of conviction, preoccupation, and distress. On these three the task were, “One of the jars (in the case of the beads) or studies (in the subscales, the scoring system is Likert-type with 5 categories (1–5)68. case of the outgoing task) has been randomly chosen. Comments will be The Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II)69–71 is a 21-item questionnaire drawn from the selected jar/study and shown to you. The comments will that assesses the severity of depressive symptoms. Higher scores reflect always come from the same jar/study and will be substituted so that the higher levels of symptom severity. proportions remain the same. You decide which jar/study the comments Premorbid estimated Intelligence Quotient (IQ) was calculated with come from. You can see as many comments as you want before deciding. vocabulary subtest of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scales (WAIS-III)72. After you are shown a bead/comment, you can ask for another bead/ comment or you can tell me that you know which jar/study was chosen Ethics committee and whether it is the study with the most negatives or the study with the The project was evaluated by the research and ethics committee of each most positives (or the jar with the most black/purple or orange/green centre involved in the recruitment and evaluation of the participants: beads). Remember that you can look at as many comments as you want Servicio Andaluz of Jaén, Málaga and Motril (Granada), Hospital de la Santa before deciding which study the comments are from. Decide only when, Creu i Sant Pau (Barcelona), Hospital Clínico Universitario de Valencia, you are sure. Now you will see the first bead/comment.” Next, for each Centro de Higiene Mental de les Corts (Barcelona), Salut Mental Parc Taulí bead/comment the participant asks to see, the following question is (Sabadell), Institut d´Assistència Sanitària Girona, and the coordinating offered, “Are you ready to decide or do you want to see more beads?” In centre Parc Sanitari Sant Joan de Déu (Sant Boi). The study participants task 1, one jar is presented with a ratio of 85% black beads to 15% orange were informed verbally and in writing of the objectives, content and beads while a second jar has the inverse proportion. The presentation of duration of the evaluations. Then, the written informed consent was the beads was: O, O, O, B, O, O, O, B, O, O, O, B, O, B, O, O, O, O. Task 2 is the signed by all participants. same, but the probability is 60%:40% and the colours are purple and green. The presentation of the beads was as follows: P, G, G, P, P, G, P, P, P, G, P, P, P, P, G, G, P, G, G. Task 3 has the same probability, 60%:40%, but instead Statistical analysis of beads, the jars contain negative and positive adjectives in this order: We conducted statistical analyses in three stages. First, we obtained N, P, P, N, N, P, N, N, N, P, N, N, N, N, P, P, N, P, P. Task 3 has socially descriptive statistics and sociodemographic and clinical variables of the relevant content and a greater emotional charge than the abstract sample. Second, we performed a Student’s t-test to investigate the tasks5. JTC was considered to be taking a decision after extracting one or associations between people that did JTC and who did not, with three SC two beads56. We code the 60:40 task and 60:40 salient task as difficult subdomains (ER, AS, ToM). The effect sizes of all comparisons were because the probability of choosing the most likely jar is lower and the calculated with Cohen’s d using pooled SD. We did not perform multiple 85:15 task as easy, since the probability is higher57. JTC bias is obtained comparison corrections due to the exploratory nature of this study73,74. when participants make their decisions based on two or fewer beads/ We performed a binary logistic regression analysis with the stepwise comments5,58. method for each of the three tasks of the JTC as the dependent variables, and the subdomains of the SC that were significant in the univariate analysis as independent variables, controlling for positive (PANSS) and Assessment of social cognition depressive (BDI) symptoms and, estimated premorbid IQ (WAIS-III). We Considering the SC, we assess three domains of SC as follows: Emotional controlled for these variables, considering the previous findings about the Processing (EP): the component of EP measured was emotional recognition relationship between positive symptoms and JTC1,17,75, JTC and IQ18,19,43, for which we used the Emotional Recognition Test59,60, that is composed of and SC (almost AS) and depressive symptoms47. All the analyses were 20 photographs that express ten basic and ten complex emotions. Theory performed using the SPSS v24 program46. of Mind (ToM): ToM was assessed using three histories of the Hinting Task61,62. The selection of the histories was made according the good psychometric properties of the Spanish version62. Attributional style (AS): AS Reporting summary was assessed with the Internal, Personal, and Situational Attributions Further information on research design is available in the Nature Research Questionnaire (IPSAQ)63. The IPSAQ has 32 items, which describe 16 Reporting Summary linked to this article. positive and 16 negative social situations. For each item, the respondent must select a single most probable causal explanation for the situation described. Then the respondent is required to decide (one option only) as DATA AVAILABILITY to whether the cause is internal (something to do with the respondent), The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding personal (something to do with another person or persons), or situational author upon reasonable request. (something to do with the circumstances, or random). Two cognitive bias scores are derived: externalising bias (EB) and personalisation bias (PB). A positive EB score indicates strong self-serving biases (blaming yourself less Received: 13 July 2021; Accepted: 17 December 2021; for negative events than positive ones). Personalising bias (PB) indicates the proportion of external attributions for negative events, which are personal and not situational. 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