EEG correlates of impairments in the processing of emotiogenic information which might reflect a genetic predisposition to schizophrenia were sought by studying the dynamics of EEG rhythm powers on presentation of neutral and emotional words in 36 patients with schizophrenia, 50 of their unaffected first-degree relatives, and 47 healthy subjects without any inherited predisposition to psychoses. In controls, passive hearing of neutral words produced minimal changes in cortical rhythms, predominantly in the form of increases in the power levels of slow and fast waves, while perception of emotional words was accompanied by generalized reductions in the power of the alpha and beta(1) rhythms and regionally specific suppression of theta and beta(2) activity. Patients and their relatives demonstrated reductions in power of alpha and beta(1) activity, with an increase in delta power on hearing both groups of words. Thus, differences in responses to neutral and emotional words in patients and their relatives were weaker, because of increased reactions to neutral words. These results may identify EEG reflections of pathology of involuntary attention, which is familial and, evidently, inherited in nature. No reduction in reactions to emotiogenic stimuli was seen in patients' families.