Thought organization and primary process in the parents of schizophrenics.

The nature of the relationship between thought organization and primary process was explored by correlating clinical indicators of thought disorder on the Rorschach and formal primary process mechanisms in the dreams of 14 parents of schizophrenics recorded during a two-week period. The relationship between variability of primary process intensity and the Thought Disorder Index produced a negative correlation at the 0.05 level of significance. Variability of primary process intensity was not found to be significantly related to the length or frequency of the dreams. This inverse relationship between formal thought disorder and variability over time of primary process in the dreams of biological relatives of schizophrenics suggested that dream constriction could be a regressive marker in the heritability of schizophrenia.