Abstract
Adequate emotion recognition is relevant to individuals' interpersonal communication. Patients with frontal traumatic brain injury (TBI) exhibit a lower response to facial emotional stimuli, influencing social interactions. In this sense, the main goal of the current study was to assess the ability of TBI patients in recognizing basic emotions. Photographs of facial expressions of five basic emotions (happiness, sadness, fear, anger, and surprise) were presented to 32 TBI patients and 41 healthy controls. Emotion recognition was measured by accuracy and reaction time. Overall performance of the TBI group was poorer than control group for emotion recognition, both in terms of accuracy and reaction time. It is suggested that TBI patients show impairment on emotion recognition, and this relation seems to be moderated by the lesion localization.
Highlights
Changes in emotional and social behavior are associated with distinct neurological disturbances
Research focused on frontal traumatic brain injury (TBI), in medial and orbitofrontal regions, has shown that one of the behavioral disturbances associated with these brain lesions is emotional deficits that influence social behavior (McDonald, 2005; Kendall & Terry, 1996)
Our results did not show any significant association in this respect (r = 0.122; p = 0.507), allowing us to infer that the mild depressive symptoms found in TBI patients did not influence, in any way, their performance on this task. It is broadly stated in the current literature that behavioral disorders found in TBI patients, in those with damage to the frontal cortex, are associated with basic emotion recognition impairment (e.g., Kendall & Terry, 1996; McDonald, 2005; Prigatano & Pribram 1982; Green et al, 2004)
Summary
Changes in emotional and social behavior are associated with distinct neurological disturbances. Research focused on frontal traumatic brain injury (TBI), in medial and orbitofrontal regions, has shown that one of the behavioral disturbances associated with these brain lesions is emotional deficits that influence social behavior (McDonald, 2005; Kendall & Terry, 1996) These alterations are emotional lability, disinhibition, inappropriate behaviors, personality changes and irritability (Ardila, 2008). These emotional disabilities are not always associated with cognitive or executive disorders (Milders, Fuchs, & Crawford, 2003) but appear to be related to the difficulty that TBI patients have in processing emotions as well as making appropriate social judgments (McDonald, 2005; Milders, Fuchs, & Crawford, 2003). Even with the finding of behavioral changes and impaired emotion processing in TBI patients, a great deal of divergence remains regarding which emotions are most impaired and regarding the role played by each cerebral hemisphere and the cerebral localization of those brain injuries that impair adequate processing of each basic emotion
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