Facial Emotion Discrimination Test Research Articles

Is impairment of facial emotion recognition independent of cognitive dysfunction in multiple sclerosis?

BackgroundEmotions expressed on the face play a key role in social cognition and communication by providing inner emotional experiences. This study aimed to evaluate facial emotion identification and discrimination and empathy abilities in patients with MS and whether it is related to cognitive dysfunction.MethodsOne hundred twenty patients with relapsing–remitting MS and age- and sex-matched 120 healthy controls were enrolled in the study. All the subjects were evaluated with the Facial Emotion Identification Test (FEIT), Facial Emotion Discrimination Test (FEIDT), and Empathy Quotient (EQ). We used the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) for depression and detailed cognitive tests, including the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), the Symbol Digit Modalities Test (SDMT), and the Paced Auditory Serial Addition Test (PASAT). The quality of life was assessed with Multiple Sclerosis Quality of Life-54 (MSQL-54).ResultsPatients with MS were 37.6 ± 9.5 years old, had a mean disease duration of 8.8 ± 6.6 (8–28) years, and a mean EDSS score of 1.6 ± 1.3 (0–4.5). We found significant differences in the identification of facial emotions, discrimination of facial emotions, and empathy in MS patients compared to controls (p < 0.05). Especially the recognition of feelings of sadness, fear, and shame was significantly lower in MS patients. The multivariate logistic regression analysis showed low SDMT and FEIDT scores which showed an independent association with MS.ConclusionsOur findings indicate that facial emotion recognition and identification deficits are remarkable among patients with MS and emotion recognition is impaired together with and independently of cognitive dysfunction in MS patients.

Facial emotion recognition is associated with executive functions and depression scores, but not staging of dementia, in mild-to-moderate Alzheimer's disease.

Although deficits in facial emotion recognition (FER) significantly affect interpersonal communication and social functioning, there is no consensus on how FER affects Alzheimer's disease (AD). In this study, we aimed to investigate the clinical and neuropsychological factors affecting the possible deficits in the FER abilities of patients with AD. This cross-sectional study included 37 patients with mild [clinical dementia rating (CDR) scale score=1] or moderate (CDR=2) AD, in whom vascular dementia and depression were excluded, and 24 cognitively normal (CDR=0) subjects. FER ability was determined using the facial emotion identification test (FEIT) and facial emotion discrimination test (FEDT). All participants underwent mini-mental state examination (MMSE), frontal assessment battery (FAB), and geriatric depression scale (GDS). The neuropsychiatric inventory-clinician rating scale (NPI-C), Katz index of independence in activities of daily living, and Lawton instrumental activities of daily living were also administered to patients with AD. The FEIT and FEDT total scores showed that patients with mild and moderate AD had significant FER deficits compared to healthy controls. However, no significant difference was observed between patients with mild and moderate AD in the FEIT and FEDT total scores. FEIT and FEDT scores were not correlated with the MMSE and NPI-C total and subscales scores in patients with AD. Linear regression indicated that FEIT and FEDT total scores were significantly related to age and FAB scores. The GDS score negatively moderated the relationship between FAB and FEDT. This study demonstrated a decreased FER ability in patients with AD. The critical point in FER deficits is the presence of dementia, not the dementia stage, in AD. It has been determined that executive functions and depression (even at a subsyndromal level), which have limited knowledge, are associated with FER abilities.

Decreased Facial Emotion Recognition in Elderly Patients With Hearing Loss Reflects Diminished Social Cognition

The main objective of this research was to evaluate the correlation between the severity of hearing loss and the facial emotional recognition as a critical part of social cognition in elderly patients. The prospective study was comprised of 85 individuals. The participants were divided into 3 groups. The first group consisted of 30 subjects older than 65 years with a bilateral pure-tone average mean >30 dB HL. The second group consisted of 30 subjects older than 65 years with a PTA mean ≤30 dB HL. The third group consisted of 25 healthy subjects with ages ranging between 18 and 45 years and a PTA mean ≤25 dB HL. A Facial Emotion Identification Test and a Facial Emotion Discrimination Test were administered to all groups. Elderly subjects with hearing loss performed significantly worse than the other 2 groups on the facial emotion identification and discrimination tests (P < .05). Appealingly, they identified a positive emotion, "happiness," more accurately in comparison to the other negative emotions. Our results suggest that increased age might be associated with decreased facial emotion identification and discrimination scores, which could be deteriorated in the presence of significant hearing loss.

An evaluation of a psychoeducation programme for emotion identification and expression in individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia.

The inability of individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia to recognize facial expressions is an important issue that has an impact on social functioning. This study was conducted to determine the effects of a psychoeducation programme for emotion identification and expression in those diagnosed with schizophrenia on their ability to identify and discriminate between emotions and social functionality. This quasi-experimental study (pretest-post-test, with control group) comprised an intervention (21) and a control (21) group conducted with individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia. A 10-week psychoeducation programme was offered to the intervention group. Measuring instruments were administered to the groups before the intervention, after the intervention, and 3months after that. The measuring instruments consisted of a personal information form, the Facial Emotion Identification Test, Facial Emotion Discrimination Test, and Personal and Social Performance Scale. The data were analysed using the 'two-way repeated measures analysis of variance'. The TREND method was used for reporting. In the first measurements taken after the psychoeducation programme, a significant difference was found between the two groups in terms of their 'Facial Emotion Identification Test' and 'Personal and Social Performance Scale' mean scores. In the measurements taken 3months after the psychoeducation programme, this difference had disappeared. The psychoeducation programme is an effective programme that makes recognition of facially expressed emotions possible and increases the social functioning of patients.

Can Social Anxiety Impact Facial Emotion Recognition in Schizophrenia?

Social anxiety is highly prevalent in individuals with schizophrenia, with studies suggesting rates of 30%. This study aimed at determining if social anxiety is linked to specific emotion recognition deficits and to specific social functioning deficits. A total of 47 participants with a diagnosis of schizophrenia and receiving outpatient services answered measures of facial recognition (Ekman; Facial Emotion Identification Test), facial discrimination (Facial Emotion Discrimination Test), role-play, social anxiety (Social Interaction Anxiety Scale and Brief Social Phobia Scale), psychiatric symptoms (Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale), self-esteem (Self-Esteem Rating Scale-Short Form), and social functioning (Social Functioning Scale). A total of 22 (47%) participants were rated as socially anxious. Those with social anxiety had worse social functioning in the domains of interpersonal communication (t[45] = 2.28, p = 0.025) and engagement (in conversations) (t[45] = 2.89, p = 0.000) and had lower self-esteem (t[45] = 4.05, p = 0.001). Participants with social anxiety also had more difficulties in recognizing neutral emotional faces (t[31] = 2.19, p = 0.036). More studies are warranted to better understand the link between neutral expression recognition and social anxiety in schizophrenia.

Research on the facial emotion identification-discrimination and communication skills in synthetic cannabinoid users

Objective: The aim of this study was to determine the effect of synthetic cannabinoid (SC) use on facial emotion identification-discrimination and communication skills. Methods: The study included 62 male patients treated for SC use and 62 male without any substance use. In the study; Sociodemographic Information Form, Addiction Profile Index (API), Facial Emotion Identification Test (FEI), Facial Emotion Discrimination Test (FED) and Communication Skills Scale (CSS) were used. Conclusions: SC users had higher FET Test scores than healthy controls. There was no significant relationship between SC use with FED and CSS scores. Discussion: The study shows that the use of SC does not adversely affect FET, FED and communication skills. In these results, addiction profiles of patients should be taken into consideration.

Social Cognition in Schizophrenia Patients and Their First-Degree Relatives.

Social cognition is a person's ability to configure the designs of relationships between themselves and others and to use these designs to guide social behaviors in a flexible manner. The models that are the most studied and describe social cognition are the theory of mind (ToM) and emotion recognition. This study was aimed to detect ToM and emotion recognition disorders in schizophrenia patients and their first-degree relatives. Thirty schizophrenia patients in remission, the first-degree relatives of schizophrenia patients (n=30), and 30 healthy volunteers who were paired with the patients in terms of age and duration of education were included in the study. The Positive and Negative Symptom Scale (PANSS), Dokuz-Eylül Theory of Mind Scale (DEToMS), Reading the Mind in the Eyes test, Facial Emotion Identification Test (FEIT), and Facial Emotion Discrimination Test (FEDT) were performed by the patients participating in this study. ToM and emotion recognition were found to be defective in the schizophrenia patients and their relatives. The performances of ToM and emotion recognition were ranked as the schizophrenia group, family group, and control group, from the worst to the best. The schizophrenia group showed poor performance in all sub-components except irony. In the family group, the empathy subcomponent showed similar performance with the control group, whereas the subcomponents of the second-order false belief, metaphor, and faux pas tests showed similar performance with the patient group. There were differences among the three groups in the first-order false belief subscale as well as the total DEToMS. The patient and family groups showed the poorest performances, whereas the control group showed the best performance. The detection of ToM and emotion recognition disorders in the remission period, regardless of the attack period and asymptomatic first-degree relatives, may support the view that the period of schizophrenia is an independent continuous variable.

Empathy, and its relationship with cognitive and emotional functions in alcohol dependency

Background: Empathy can be defined as the ability to understand the other’s thoughts and feelings. It contains both cognitive and emotional components.Aims: The aim of this study was to investigate the empathy ability of patients with alcohol dependency in association with cognitive and emotional functions, after acute detoxification and during long-term abstinence.Methods: Thirty-three alcohol dependent inpatients that completed a detoxification process and stayed abstinent throughout the study, and 33 healthy comparison subjects that matched the patients for age, gender, and education level were included in the study. All the participants were administered the Facial Emotion Identification Test (FEIT), Facial Emotion Discrimination Test (FEDT), Trail Making Test (TMT), Digit Span Test (DST), Auditory Consonant Trigram Test (ACT), and Empathy Quotient Scale (EQS). All the tests were repeated after 3 months of abstinence.Results: At the first evaluation conducted after detoxification, patients performed significantly worse than healthy comparisons in almost all tests. At the second evaluation, which was conducted after 3 months of abstinence, the patients improved significantly in all measures, and no significant differences were detected between the patient and comparison groups. There were significant correlations between the test scores and EQS score.Conclusions: Alcohol dependency has deleterious effects on empathy ability, and cognitive and emotional functions. Those impairments can improve with abstinence. Empathy ability has strong relationships with cognitive and emotional functions.

Facial emotion recognition deficits in abstinent cannabis dependent patients

BackgroundCannabis is clearly the most popular illicit drug in North America, Europe and in other parts of the world. Evidence is accumulating for the involvement of the endocannabinoid system in emotional processing. However, only few studies examined emotional processing in chronic, heavy cannabis users and these studies were performed in cannabis dependent patients who were abstinent for 12–48hours. The aim of this study was to investigate facial emotion identification and discrimination abilities in patients with cannabis dependence who were abstinent for at least 1month. MethodsThe study included 30 males with cannabis dependency according to DSM-IV criteria and who had been abstinent for at least 1month and 30 healthy controls. All the subjects were evaluated with Facial Emotion Identification Test (FEIT) and Facial Emotion Discrimination Test (FEDT). ResultsThe main finding of this study was the presence of deficits in both identification and discrimination of facial emotions in cannabis dependent patients during abstinence. In addition, when we examined negative and positive emotions separately, we found out that abstinent cannabis dependent patients performed significantly worse than controls in the identification of negative emotions but not positive emotions. ConclusionsOur findings indicate that facial emotion recognition deficits which have previously been observed in current cannabis users are still detectable in abstinent cannabis dependent patients and do not improve quickly with abstinence (an average of 3.2months).

Deficits in recognition, identification, and discrimination of facial emotions in patients with bipolar disorder

To analyze the recognition, identification, and discrimination of facial emotions in a sample of outpatients with bipolar disorder (BD). Forty-four outpatients with diagnosis of BD and 48 matched control subjects were selected. Both groups were assessed with tests for recognition (Emotion Recognition-40 - ER40), identification (Facial Emotion Identification Test - FEIT), and discrimination (Facial Emotion Discrimination Test - FEDT) of facial emotions, as well as a theory of mind (ToM) verbal test (Hinting Task). Differences between groups were analyzed, controlling the influence of mild depressive and manic symptoms. Patients with BD scored significantly lower than controls on recognition (ER40), identification (FEIT), and discrimination (FEDT) of emotions. Regarding the verbal measure of ToM, a lower score was also observed in patients compared to controls. Patients with mild syndromal depressive symptoms obtained outcomes similar to patients in euthymia. A significant correlation between FEDT scores and global functioning (measured by the Functioning Assessment Short Test, FAST) was found. These results suggest that, even in euthymia, patients with BD experience deficits in recognition, identification, and discrimination of facial emotions, with potential functional implications.

Facial Emotion Recognition in Schizophrenia: The Impact of Gender

ObjectivePrevious studies reported gender differences for facial emotion recognition in healthy people, with women performing better than men. Few studies that examined gender differences for facial emotion recognition in schizophrenia brought out inconsistent findings. The aim of this study is to investigate gender differences for facial emotion identification and discrimination abilities in patients with schizophrenia.Methods35 female and 35 male patients with schizophrenia, along with 35 female and 35 male healthy controls were included in the study. All the subjects were evaluated with Facial Emotion Identification Test (FEIT), Facial Emotion Discrimination Test (FEDT), and Benton Facial Recognition Test (BFRT). Patients' psychopathological symptoms were rated by means of the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS).ResultsMale patients performed significantly worse than female patients on FEIT total, and negative scores. Male controls performed significantly worse than female controls on FEIT total and negative scores. On all tasks, female patients performed comparable with controls. Male patients performed significantly worse than controls on FEIT, and FEDT.ConclusionWomen with schizophrenia outperformed men for facial emotion recognition ability in a pattern that is similar with the healthy controls. It could be claimed that male patients with schizophrenia need special consideration for emotion perception deficits.

SOCIAL COGNITION AND FUNCTIONAL OUTCOME AS SEPARATE DOMAINS IN SCHIZOPHRENIA

Background: Deficits in social cognition are recognised as an important feature of schizophrenia, mainly due to their close association with poor functional outcome. Impaired functioning in the domains of processing of emotions and interpretation of behaviour of others in the social milieu appears to impact functional outcome in individuals with schizophrenia. Impairments in cognition generally cooccur in these individuals and the magnitudes of deficits in social cognition and cognition are usually strongly associated. Furthermore, whereas cognitive deficits reportedly account for 10%-40% of the variance in functional outcome, social cognition has been shown to have a unique relationship to functional outcome, beyond that of cognitive function. In otherwords, social cognitionmay be amediating factor through which cognition impacts functional outcome. However, both social cognition and functional outcome are broad constructs encompassing multiple abilities. The fact that there is a wide range of measures used to test the above domains further complicates an understanding of the association between social cognition and functional outcome. The purpose of this study was to investigate the factorial validity of social cognitive constructs against that of functional outcome in schizophrenia. Methods: The subjects were 103 individuals with schizophrenia. Facial Emotion Identification Test (FEIT), the Facial Emotion Discrimination Test (FEDT), the Social Cue Recognition Test (SCRT) and the Situational Features Recognition Test (SFRT) were used as measures of social cognition. Cognitive tests were chosen in order to assess a wide range of cognitive domains and were consistent with batteries generally used in the schizophrenia literature. Functional outcome was assessed using two measures: the Quality of Life Scale (QLS) and the Social Functioning Scale (SFS). The Assessment of Interpersonal Problem Solving (AIPPS) scale, which consists of three subscales, was used as a measure of social problem solving. Symptoms were assessed with the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale for Schizophrenia (PANSS). Results: Using a Principal Component Analysis (PCA) with varimax rotation all social cognitive tasks (i.e. FAIT, FADT, SCRT and SFRT) loaded on factor 1 (SOC COG), all three AIPPS sub-scales loaded on factor 2 (SOCPROBLEM), andbothSFS andQLS loadedon factor 3 (SOC FUNCTION). SOC COG was significantly associated with cognition (r=.54, p<0.001) and with positive (r=-.28, p<0.01) and negative symptoms (r=-.23, p<0.5). SOC PROBLEM was associated with positive (r=-.22, p<0.05) andnegative symptoms (r=-.26, p<0.05) andSOCFUNCTIONwas significantlyassociatedwithpositive (r=-.47, p<0.001) and negative symptoms (r=-.54, p<0.001). Discussion: The factor analysis clearly suggests that social cognition and social functioning are separate constructs. Interestingly a measure of social problem solving that has been at times considered a measure of functioning was differentiated from both social cognition and social functioning. Social cognition was the only factor that was significantly associated with cognition suggesting cognitive underpinning to social perception, social knowledge, and the ability to recognise affect in others. Further, all three factors correlated with both positive and negative symptoms suggesting that interpretation and evaluation of events in the social environment as well as social interactions in schizophrenia may depend on the level of psychotic symptoms.

Facial emotion recognition in patients with schizophrenia and their siblings

Background: Deficits in recognition of facial emotions have been widely reported in patients with schizophrenia. Previous studies that examined recognition of facial emotions in relatives of patients with schizophrenia brought out inconsistent results. Aims: In this study, we aimed to examine facial emotion identification and discrimination abilities in patients with schizophrenia and their healthy siblings to find out whether familial vulnerability to schizophrenia is associated with deficits in facial emotion recognition. Methods: Patients with schizophrenia (n=57), their unaffected biological siblings (n=58) and healthy controls (n=58) were included in the study. The three groups did not differ significantly for gender, age and education level. All the participants were evaluated with the Facial Emotion Identification Test (FEIT) and Facial Emotion Discrimination Test (FEDT). Results: Patients with schizophrenia performed significantly worse than controls on FEIT and FEDT. Siblings performed significantly better than patients and significantly worse than controls on FEIT and FEDT. Conclusions: Impaired performance of siblings on facial emotion identification and discrimination tasks provides evidence for the hypothesis that facial emotion recognition deficits are transmitted in families and may represent a heritable endophenotype of schizophrenia.