Recognition of Facial Expressions of Different Emotional Intensities in Patients with Frontotemporal Lobar Degeneration

Roy P C Kessels,Janine Diehl,Lotte Gerritsen,Barbara Montagne,Adrian Danek,Nibal Ackl

doi:10.1155/2007/868431

Abstract

Behavioural problems are a key feature of frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD). Also, FTLD patients show impairments in emotion processing. Specifically, the perception of negative emotional facial expressions is affected. Generally, however, negative emotional expressions are regarded as more difficult to recognize than positive ones, which thus may have been a confounding factor in previous studies. Also, ceiling effects are often present on emotion recognition tasks using full-blown emotional facial expressions. In the present study with FTLD patients, we examined the perception of sadness, anger, fear, happiness, surprise and disgust at different emotional intensities on morphed facial expressions to take task difficulty into account. Results showed that our FTLD patients were specifically impaired at the recognition of the emotion anger. Also, the patients performed worse than the controls on recognition of surprise, but performed at control levels on disgust, happiness, sadness and fear. These findings corroborate and extend previous results showing deficits in emotion perception in FTLD.

Highlights

Frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD) is a neurodegenerative disorder characterized by atrophy of the frontal cortex and the anterior parts of the temporal lobes, and is a relatively common cause of dementia, accounting for about twenty percent of cases of dementia with pre-senile onset [14]
The aim of the present study was to examine the perception of emotional facial expressions in patients with FTLD
The results on the full-blown facial expressions showed that the FTLD patients were impaired at the recognition of the emotion anger, but performed equal to controls on the other emotions

Summary

Introduction

Frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD) is a neurodegenerative disorder characterized by atrophy of the frontal cortex and the anterior parts of the temporal lobes, and is a relatively common cause of dementia, accounting for about twenty percent of cases of dementia with pre-senile onset [14]. The earliest neurobehavioural changes in FTLD often relate to changes in personality and social conduct. Clinical findings include loss of insight, reduced empathy, poor self care, mood changes, changes in eating pattern, disinhibition, apathy and mental rigidity [18]. A number of studies have recently examined emotion processing in patients with FTLD. Lavenu et al [7] were the first to examine a group of patients on recognition of facial expressions and used the seven emotions anger, sadness, disgust, happiness, fear, surprise and contempt. Their patients performed worse than healthy controls and patients suffering from Alzheimer’s disease (AD) on the emotions anger, sadness and disgust.

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