Social cognition may be critical to the impoverished social functioning seen in serious mental illness.
However, although social-cognitive deficits are consistently demonstrated in schizophrenia spectrum disorders
(SSD), studies in bipolar disorder (BD) have produced inconsistent results. This inconsistency may relate to
symptom profiles of patients studied, particularly the presence or absence of psychotic features. Thus, we examined
social cognition in bipolar disorder with psychotic features (BD+) versus without psychotic features (BD−)relative
to SSD and controls.