Facial Expressions In Patients Research Articles

Impact of the orofacial muscular rehabilitation exercise on facial expression recovery post-orthognathic surgery

ObjectiveThis study aimed to evaluate the impact of myofunctional rehabilitation of the orofacial muscles through specific exercises on the recovery of facial expression in patients following orthognathic surgery. Material and MethodsThe study included 62 patients who underwent Le Fort I and sagittal split ramus osteotomy (SSRO). Patients were divided into two groups: the first group started immediate post-operative myofunctional rehabilitation of the orofacial muscles through specific exercises. In contrast, patients in Group II did not undergo any myofunctional rehabilitation post-operative exercises. The recovery of facial expressions postoperatively was evaluated in both calm and smiling states by comparing the differences between 3D facial scanning data of chosen facial anatomical structures collected at five key time points: pre-surgery (D0), 2 days (D2), 14 days (D14), 1 month (D30), and 3 months (D90) postoperatively. ResultsThe analysis revealed that characteristic angles and lengths experienced significant changes post-surgery, with ∠chRnchL and ∠chRsnchL decreasing at D2 and normalizing by D30 in the experimental group, while the control group showed a slower recovery, normalizing by D90. The ChL-R length decreased at D2, returning to normal by D30 in the experimental group and D90 in the control group. The height Li-Ls increased at D2 and normalized by D30 in calm and smiling expressions across single and double jaw surgery patients. These findings underscore the more rapid recovery in the experimental group compared to the control group (P < 0.05; P < 0.005; P < 0.0001). ConclusionInitiating myofunctional rehabilitation immediately following orthognathic surgery enhances facial muscle function recovery, improves patient confidence, and expedites social reintegration. This approach is crucial for functional and psychological benefits.

Reactivity and stability in facial expressions as an indicator of therapeutic alliance strength

Objective: Aspects of our emotional state are constantly being broadcast via our facial expressions. Psychotherapeutic theories highlight the importance of emotional dynamics between patients and therapists for an effective therapeutic relationship. Two emotional dynamics suggested by the literature are emotional reactivity (i.e., when one person is reacting to the other) and emotional stability (i.e., when a person has a tendency to remain in a given emotional state). Yet, little is known empirically about the association between these dynamics and the therapeutic alliance. This study investigates the association between the therapeutic alliance and the emotional dynamics of reactivity and stability, as manifested in the facial expressions of patients and therapists within the session. Methods: Ninety-four patients with major depressive disorder underwent short-term treatment for depression (N = 1256 sessions). Results: Both therapist reactivity and stability were associated with the alliance, across all time spans. Patient reactivity was associated with the alliance only in a short time span (1 s). Conclusions: These findings may potentially guide therapists in the field to attenuate not only their emotional reaction to their patients, but also their own unique presence in the therapy room.

Facial expression of patients with Graves' orbitopathy.

Patients with Graves' orbitopathy (GO) have characteristic facial expressions that are different from those of healthy individuals due to the combination of somatic and psychiatric symptoms. However, the facial expressions of GO patients have not yet been described and analyzed systematically. Thus, the present study aimed to present the facial expressions of GO patients and explore their applications in clinical practice. Facial image and clinical data of 943 GO patients were included, and 126 patients answered quality of life (GO-QOL) questionnaires. Each patient was labeled for one facial expression. Then, a portrait was drawn for every facial expression. Logistic and linear regression was performed to analyze the correlation between facial expression and clinical indicators, including QOL, disease activity and severity. The VGG-19 network model was utilized to discriminate facial expressions automatically. Two groups, i.e., the non-negative emotion (neutral, happy) and the negative emotion (disgust, angry, fear, sadness, surprise), and seven expressions of GO patients were systematically analyzed. Facial expression was statistically associated with GO activity (P = 0.002), severity (P < 0.001), QOL visual functioning subscale scores (P = 0.001), and QOL appearance subscale score (P = 0.012). The deep learning model achieved satisfactory results (accuracy 0.851, sensitivity 0.899, precision 0.899, specificity 0.720, F1 score 0.899, and AUC 0.847). As a novel clinical sign, facial expression holds the potential to be incorporated into GO assessment system in the future. The discrimination model may assist clinicians in real-life patient care.

Facial emotion recognition deficits in schizophrenia - a review of research and a model of pathogenesis

Objective: The aim of the paper is to describe in detail the problems in the field of recognising emotional facial expressions in patients with schizophrenia. This paper also analyses studies and theoretical literature on the potential connections between deficits in recognition of emotional facial expressions and neuronal dysfunctions and attachment styles. Materials and method: The literature review was performed using the following databases: EBSCO, PsycINFO, PubMed, and Google Scholar. The databases were searched using the following keywords: ‘emotion’, ‘facial emotion’, ‘facial expression’. Those terms were combined with the words 'recognition', 'perception', 'genetic', 'attachment style' and each time with the term 'schizophrenia'. Results: The literature review clearly confirms that among people suffering from schizophrenia there are problems with recognising emotional facial expressions. Studies suggest that the visual perception of patients is related to the recognition of facial expressions. Studies also confirm the relationship of neuronal dysfunctions and genetic factors with the recognition of emotional facial expressions. Discussion and conclusions: The genesis of problems in recognising emotional facial expressions in patients with schizophrenia is multifactorial in nature. The influence of attachment styles on epigenetic mechanisms and the development of neural structures related to emotion recognition remains unverified. In the future, this study will allow for the creation of more accurate models of the pathogenesis of these deficits.

Facial muscle movements in patients with Parkinson's disease undergoing phonation tests.

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a serious neurodegenerative disease affecting the elderly. In general, the locomotion deficit, which seriously affects the daily life of patients with PD, usually occurs at a later stage. The mask face symptom meanwhile progressively worsens. However, facial muscle disorders and changes involved in the freezing mask are unclear. In this study, we recruited 35 patients with PD and 26 age- and sex-balanced controls to undergo phonation tests, while the built-in camera on the laptop recorded their facial expressions during the whole pronunciation process. Furthermore, FaceReader (version 7.0; Noldus Information Technology, Wageningen, Netherlands) was used to analyze changes in PD facial landmark movement and region movement. The two-tailed Student's t-test showed that the changes in facial landmark movement among 49 landmarks were significantly lower in patients with PD than in the control group (P < 0.05). The data on facial region movement revealed that the eyes and upper lip of patients with PD differed significantly from those in the control group. Patients with PD had defects in facial landmark movement and regional movement when producing a single syllable, double syllable, and multiple syllables, which may be related to reduced facial expressions in patients with PD.

Two stream Non-Local CNN-LSTM network for the auxiliary assessment of mental retardation

At present, the assessment of mental retardation is mainly based on clinical interview, which requires the participation of experienced psychiatrist and is laborious. Studies have shown that there are correlations between mental retardation and abnormal behaviors (such as, hyperkinetic, tics, stereotypes, etc.). On the basis of this fact, a two stream Non-Local CNN-LSTM network has been proposed to learn the features of upper body behavior and facial expression of patients, thus, to achieve the preliminary screening of mental retardation. Specifically, RGB and optical flow are extracted separately from interview videos, and a two stream network based on contribution mechanism is designed to effectively fuse the information of two kinds of images, which may update the network in a new approach of alternating iteration training to find the optimal model. Besides, by introducing non-local mechanism and adopting it to the network, the global feature sensing can be established more effectively to reduce the background interference for video clip in a short time zone. Experiments on clinical video dataset show that the performance of proposed model is better than other prevalent deep learning methods of behavioral feature learning, the accuracy reaches 89.15% in basic experiment, and is further improved to 89.52% in the supplementary experiment. Furthermore, the experimental results show that this method still has a lot of room for improvement. In general, our work indicates that the proposed model has potential value for the clinical diagnosis and screening of mental retardation.

Facial emotion recognition in Parkinson's disease: The role of executive and affective domains.

The ability to recognize emotions from facial expression (FER) may be impaired in Parkinson's disease (PD). We aimed to explore FER in PD patients by using a dynamic presentation of emotions across different intensities and to examine the extent to which executive and affective alterations contributed to FER deficits. Fifteen PD patients and 15 healthy controls were assessed on the emotion recognition task (ERT). We also explored how clinical and executive factors could have contributed to ERT accuracy. PD patients showed poorer performance on the ERT, specifically on angry expressions, but they benefited from increased intensity as much as controls did. Differences were also found for apathy, depression, and executive tests, especially in the inhibition domain. Importantly, differences between groups on the ERT disappeared when controlling for inhibition and the affective symptoms. A significant effect of inhibition dysfunction was also observed on the ERT performance. Our findings demonstrate the presence of emotion recognition deficits of morphed facial expressions in patients with PD. Moreover, they suggest that inhibition dysfunctions may act as an important factor negatively influencing FER. The present study highlights the complex nature of emotion processing and its relation with emotional-affective and cognitive aspects to provide a better understanding of FER deficits in PD. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

The cerebellum as a moderator of negative bias of facial expression processing in depressive patients

• Negative bias (NB) in emotion processing is an important aspect of MDD. • Neural basis of NB in facial expression processing in MDD was assessed. • Higher activation in posterior cerebellum was found to relate to higher NB in MDD. • Higher activation in the same area was related to a lower NB in the HC group. • This area might mediate biasing emotion processing by reflecting self-mood. Negative bias—a mood-congruent bias in emotion processing—is an important aspect of major depressive disorder (MDD), and such a bias in facial expression recognition has a significant effect on patients’ social lives. Neuroscience research shows abnormal activity in emotion-processing systems regarding facial expressions in MDD. However, the neural basis of negative bias in facial expression processing has not been explored directly. Sixteen patients with MDD and twenty-three healthy controls (HC) who underwent an fMRI scan during an explicit facial emotion task with happy to sad faces were selected. We identified brain areas in which the MDD and HC groups showed different correlations between the behavioral negative bias scores and functional activities. Behavioral data confirmed the existence of a higher negative bias in the MDD group. Regarding the relationship with neural activity, higher activity of happy faces in the posterior cerebellum was related to a higher negative bias in the MDD group, but lower negative bias in the HC group. The sample size was small, and the possible effects of medication were not controlled for in this study. We confirmed a negative bias in the recognition of facial expressions in patients with MDD. fMRI data suggest the cerebellum as a moderator of facial emotion processing, which biases the recognition of facial expressions toward their own mood.

The Emotional Expression Response of a Patient Based on their Facial Expression&amp;lt;br/&amp;gt;—Focus on Music Stimuli

Objective: To determine whether patients with unresponsive wakefulness syndrome respond to auditory stimuli based on changes in facial expressions. Participants: Six patients diagnosed with disorders of consciousness due to brain injury with permission for participation from their doctor. Design: In this hypothesis-driven observational study, the facial expressions of patients with unresponsive wakefulness syndrome were video-recorded for 5 min before and during auditory stimulation in three consecutive weekly sessions. Main Measures: Facial muscle movement was quantified using FaceReader® software (Noldus, Wageningen, Netherlands). Valence/action unit values were plotted to detail facial expression changes. Heart rate values were also plotted. These parameters were compared before and after stimulation. Results: No significant differences in valence integral values or average heart rate were observed between the pre- and intra-stimulus conditions. However, valence signals increased in approximately half of the sessions, indicating that some patients with unresponsive wakefulness syndrome may exhibit emotional responses to auditory stimuli. Analysis of action unit integral values indicated that movement of the eyebrows and eyelids on the upper part of the face occurred during auditory stimulation. Furthermore, the types of auditory stimuli differed depending on the session for the 12 sessions of voice stimuli, whereas the changes in average heart rate differed in each of nine sessions of music stimuli. Because the changes in average heart rate were similar, it is possible that musical stimuli are more suitable than voice stimuli. Conclusion: Some patients with unresponsive wakefulness syndrome may have an emotional response to auditory stimuli. Our findings indicate that it may be possible to distinguish the emotional expression response of a patient based on their facial expression.

Exploration of Clinical Significance for Facial Expressions in Patients with Thyroid-Associated Ophthalmopathy and Establishment of Corresponding Deep Learning Model

Exploration of Clinical Significance for Facial Expressions in Patients with Thyroid-Associated Ophthalmopathy and Establishment of Corresponding Deep Learning Model

Changes in facial expressions in patients with Parkinson's disease during the phonation test and their correlation with disease severity

PurposeParkinson's disease (PD) is a serious neurodegenerative disease affecting more than one million people globally. A mask-like face is an important early motor symptom of PD; it develops gradually and is asymptomatic. However, the relationship between the severity of PD and changes in facial expressions remains unclear. We aimed to elucidate the inner linkage. MethodFrom January to September 2019, we recruited 16 PD patients in the First Affiliated Hospital of Chengdu Medical College and 16 healthy individuals. Participants performed phonation tests, during which their facial expressions were recorded, and the changes were analyzed using Noldus FaceReader 7.0. ResultsFacial expressions of neutral feelings, happiness, surprise, valence, and arousal during single-, double- and multiple-syllable phonation tests were significantly lower in patients with PD, whereas those of sadness, anger, scared, and disgust were significantly higher compared to those in healthy subjects. There were significant correlations between the changes in facial expressions and the severity of PD. ConclusionPatients with PD displayed a decrease in positive facial expressions, whereas they presented an increase in negative expressions. This is helpful for further research on facial dyskinesia in PD.

Sensory trick effect in craniofacial dystonia as one of the possible impacts of wearing face masks during the COVID-19 pandemic

BackgroundThe report of a patient with blepharospasm during the COVID-19 pandemic suggested a potential ameliorating effect of wearing a face mask.ObjectiveWe prospectively evaluated a possible symptom change through wearing a face mask in all consecutive patients with craniofacial hyperkinesias in our botulinum toxin outpatient treatment cohort.MethodsPatients with craniofacial hyperkinesia were asked to rate changes of symptoms between − 2 (markedly worsened), − 1 (slightly worsened), 0 (no change), + 1 (slightly improved) and + 2 (markedly improved).ResultsOf 101 patients (19 with blepharospasm [BSP], 54 with cervical dystonia [CD], 6 with oromandibular dystonia [OMD], and 22 with hemifacial spasm [HFS]) 81 (80%) rated no symptom change, 11 (11%) symptom improvement, and 9 (9%) symptom worsening. Improvements in 9 of the 82 dystonia patients (BSP, CD, OMD) consisted of a perceived decrease in dystonic activity. 33% of dystonia patients had previously noticed or used a sensory trick. Its presence turned out to be a significant predictor of improvement during mask wearing. Deteriorations were attributed from all patients to disturbing effects of the mask interacting with facial muscle overactivity. Improvements in HSF patients were attributed to the symptom-hiding nature of the mask and not to an effect on the spasm activity itself.ConclusionsWearing a face mask did not affect self-perceived symptoms in 80% of patients with craniofacial hyperkinesis. 11% of patients reported an improvement, which occurred as sensory trick in dystonia patients and as a concealment of a stigmatizing facial expression in patients with HSF.

Emotional Response to Humour Perception and Gelotophobia Among Healthy Individuals and Patients with Schizophrenia and Depression, with Signs of a High Clinical Risk of Psychosis.

Investigating early changes in the emotional sphere within the schizophrenia course is a perspective direction in clinical psychology and psychiatry. Intactness of positive emotions, in particular, humour perception, may be a very important resource for patients. At the same time, humour perception is very sensitive to pathological conditions, such as the fear of being laughed at, known as gelotophobia. Those with gelotophobia perceive laughter as dangerous, rather than pleasant, and they can hardly distinguish between teasing and ridicule. Gelotophobia was confirmed to be expressed among people with mental disorders. Nonetheless, knowledge relating to the fear of being laughed at, was mostly generated among the non-clinical samples. Thus, the aim of the study was to provide more clinical data on gelotophobia manifestations associated with schizophrenia spectrum disorders; the emotional response and facial expression of patients with gelotophobia were studied, in particular, regarding their perception of humour, including during the early stages of disorders, by comparison with healthy individuals. n=30 controls and n=32 patients with schizophrenia and with depression with signs of a high clinical risk of psychosis took part. Two short videos, comic and neutral, were shown to the participants, while videotaping their facial expression, followed each by a self-reported measure of emotional responses. Participants also completed the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, the PhoPhiKat30 and the Toronto Alexithymia Scale. Gelotophobia was significantly higher within the clinical group. It correlated with a lower frequency of grins among the patients during the comic video, while this was not the case in the control group. Gelotophobia was related to state and trait anxiety in both groups, but only in the clinical group did state anxiety increase after watching the comic video. Gelotophobia correlated with alexithymia and was twice higher among the patients compared to the controls. Thus, gelotophobia has not only quantitative, but also qualitative specifics in patients with schizophrenia, and those with depression with signs of a clinically high risk of psychosis, compared to healthy controls.

Treatment of facial nerve palsies with laser and endermotherapy: a report of two cases

Facial nerve palsy involves paralysis of unknown origin caused by trauma, infectious disease or metabolic disorders. The aim of this study was to employ low-level laser therapy (LLLT) in the recovery of two patients with facial nerve palsies due to trauma and Bell’s palsy (BP), respectively. LLLT was used with a gallium aluminum arsenide laser (780 nm) in the first case and in the second case LLLT (660 nm and 808 nm) was used synergistically with a vacuum therapy device. No medication was administered during laser treatment and vacuum therapy. The treatments resulted in complete recovery and normal facial expression in both patients including improved facial movement and facial symmetry at rest. With this result in mind, we believe LLLT and combined vacuum therapy may be an alternative treatment to decrease the recovery time of facial expression in normal patients with facial nerve palsies and BP.

An Objective Method for Assessment of Facial Expression in Patients with Parkinson’s Disease and Healthy Population

Abstract Hypomimia is a common symptom of Parkinson’s disease. At the present time, issues related to existence of interrelations between hypomimia and manifestations of common hypokinesia remain under-investigated in aspects of both clinical manifestations and rehabilitation efficacy. An objective method for facial muscle movement diagnostics is necessary to achieve this goal. The article presents novel experience in application of a proprietary method using objective facial expression assessment video analysis on the example of a healthy female subject and a female patient with Parkinson’s disease. The Parkinson’s female patient had objective symptoms of hypomimia: a decrease in velocity and amplitude of eyebrow and mouth movement, slow winking. Therefore, application of this method creates prerequisites for more in-depth study of theoretical and clinical aspects in facial expression of Parkinson’s disease patients.

Dysfunction in Automatic Processing of Emotional Facial Expressions in Patients with Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome: An Event-Related Potential Study.

AimObstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) is a prevalent chronic disease characterized by sleep fragmentation and intermittent hypoxemia. Several studies suggested that electrophysiological changes and neurocognitive abnormalities occurred in OSAS patients. In this study, we compared automatic processing of emotional facial expressions schematic in OSAS patients and matched healthy controls via assessing expression-related mismatch negativity (EMMN).MethodsTwenty-two OSAS patients (mean age 44.59 years) and twenty-one healthy controls (mean age 42.71 years) were enrolled in this study. All participants underwent Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) scale test and polysomnographic recording. An expression-related oddball paradigm was used to elicit EMMN and the electroencephalogram was recorded and analyzed. Furthermore, Pearson’s correlations were calculated to discuss the correlation between neuropsychological test scores, clinical variables and electrophysiological data.ResultsCompared with healthy controls, OSAS sufferers demonstrated significantly reduced EMMN mean amplitudes within corresponding time intervals, regardless of happy or sad conditions. Meanwhile, we observed that amplitude of sad EMMN was larger (more negative) than happy EMNN in healthy controls, while not in patients. Moderate correlations were found between MoCA test scores, sleep parameters and EMMN amplitudes.ConclusionOur findings suggested pre-attentive dysfunction of processing emotional facial expressions in patients with OSAS, without the existence of negative bias effect. Moreover, correlation analysis showed that clinical characteristics of OSAS patients could affect EMMN amplitudes. Further studies on the advantages of EMMN as clinical and electrophysiological indicators of OSAS are warranted.

Advances in infrared thermography: Surgical aspects, vascular changes, and pain monitoring in veterinary medicine.

One of the main functions of infrared thermography (IRT) consists in detecting temperature changes in organisms caused by variations in surface blood circulation. IRT is a useful tool that has been used mainly as a diagnostic method for various stress-causing pathologies, though recent suggestions indicate that it can be used to assess the block quality of certain body regions. In the field of anaesthesiology, IRT has been applied to brachial and epidural blocks, while in algology, changes in surface blood circulation associated with sympathetic activity have been investigated. Thermography has also been employed to complement pain level scales based on the facial expressions of patients in critical condition, or after surgery. In addition, it has been used as a tool in research designed to evaluate different surgical procedures in human medicine, as in the case of surgical burrs for placing dental implants, where IRT helps assess the degree of heating associated with bone devascularisation, reduction in vascular perfusion as a consequence of stroke, and changes in the autonomous nervous system, or the degree of vascular changes in flaps applied to burn patients. In veterinary medicine, thermography has brought several benefits for animals in terms of evaluating lesions, diseases, and surgical procedures. The aim of this review is to evaluate how IRT can be used as a tool in surgical procedures, cases of vascular change, and pain monitoring in veterinary medicine with an emphasis on small animals.

Trividha Pariksha and its importance: A Review Article

Ayurveda also takes into account pathogenic factors, season, and a patient's entire course of action (diet, drug, and regimen compatible with the constitution) for the expression of the disease. Ayurveda, the physician's approach of clinical examination (disease diagnosis and patient diagnosis) is used to determine the root cause of the disease and to determine the treatment of the disease. The comprehensive examination is a source of fundamental and personalized knowledge about the patient that strengthens the clinician - patient relationship. Most people seeking your care have specific worries or symptoms. The comprehensive examination provides a more complete basis for assessing these concerns and answering patient questions. Darshan or direct observation is the first diagnostic technique of the three fold rogi pareeksha methods. Factors those are elicited by Chakshurindriya (eyes) are comes in this category. It begins with the initial greeting and continues through the entire data collection process. Observation or inspection of the patient is done through the patient’s general appearance, Eyes, Skin, Scalp hair, body hair, Teeth, Walking, Complexion etc. Inspection begins through active observation. Physician must note the facial expressions of patients even during interrogating the patient.

M3. THEORY OF MIND IN INDIVIDUALS WITH FIRST-EPISODE OF SCHIZOPHRENIA AND CHILDHOOD TRAUMA

BackgroundA history of Childhood Trauma (CT), i.e., physical or emotional abuse or neglect, and sexual abuse, is reportedly more prevalent in individuals suffering from psychosis than in the general population. Crucial questions remain unclear about the nature of interpersonal functioning in CT survivors, involving the capacity to understand and interpret other people′s thoughts and feelings, especially in individuals with First-Episode of Schizophrenia (FESz). We investigated the Theory of Mind (ToM) performance of patients with FESz related to CT in comparison to healthy controls (HC).MethodsParticipants (n=77) completed the Eye Task Revised (RMET) and the Childhood Experience of Care Abuse Questionnaire (CECA-Q). The Word Accentuation Test (TAP) was used to estimate a premorbid IQ. Seven-teen patients with FESz (Mean age = 24.9, SD = 5.4, Male = 79.6%; Education = 10.7, SD = 1.5 years) were recruited at the First-Episode Psychosis Program, Hospital 12 de Octubre Madrid, and 60 HC (Mean age = 27.6, SD = 7.2; Male = 45.6%; Education = 14.5, SD = 2.8 years) were healthy volunteers. Between-group comparisons were made using ANCOVA, considering group and CT as fixed factors. Age, years of education and IQ were included as covariates.ResultsPreliminary results showed that compared to controls, patients with FESz performed worse on the recognition and interpretation of facial expressions, in both male and female faces (p < .001). Patients with FESz did not perform differently than HC in the recognition and interpretation of positive facial expressions (p = .074). However, lower interpretation of negative facial expressions (p < .001) and of neutral facial expressions (p < .001) was shown in patients with FESz compared to HC. Higher interpretation of facial expressions was shown in FESz patients with CT (n = 12), only of female faces (p < .001), compared to patients without CT (n = 7). It was also shown higher interpretation of facial expressions in HC with CT (n = 28), only of negative facial expressions (p = .014), compared to HC without CT (n = 32). Female patients with FESz performed worse on the recognition and interpretation of negative (p = .024) and neutral faces (p < .001), only of male faces (p = .038), compared to female HC. Male patients with FESz performed worse on the recognition and interpretation of positive (p = .038) and negative facial expressions (p = .001) of male faces (p < .001), compared to male HC. In comparison to male FESz patients without CT, male FESz patients with CT showed higher interpretation of female faces (p = .030). In comparison to male HC without CT, male HC with CT showed higher interpretation of male faces (p = .031).DiscussionAccording to previous research, our preliminary findings indicated theory of mind deficits in patients with FESz. Interestingly, in our study the alterations on the interpretation and recognition of facial expressions were shown only of negative and neutral, but not of positive facial expressions. Furthermore, and contrary to literature, we found more interpretation and recognition of facial expressions in patients and healthy controls survivors of CT. However, the above-mentioned was specifically observed of female faces in patients and of negative facial expressions in healthy controls. In addition, female and male patients and healthy controls seem to interpret differently facial expressions related to childhood trauma. Nevertheless, increasing our sample size would give us the opportunity to draw further conclusions about how adverse experiences during childhood may influence social abilities in patients with FESz.

Dysfunction of processing task-irrelevant emotional faces in primary insomnia patients: an evidence from expression-related visual MMN

According to the cognitive processing perspectives, patients with insomnia have insufficient neural management of expressional information. In this study, we compared the pre-attentive processing function of task-irrelevant facial expressions in patients with primary insomnia (PI) and matched healthy controls, with expression-related mismatch negativity (EMMN) elicited by emotional faces as the indicator. Using three schematic facial expressions (neutral, happy, and sad) as task-irrelevant stimuli, we investigated the visual processing of PI patients (n = 22) and healthy subjects (n = 22) in an expression-related oddball paradigm designed to elicit the visual N170 and EMMN component. After recording and analyzing the electroencephalogram of all participants, amplitude analysis of N170 and EMMN was eventually conducted under corresponding time window. Compared with control group, the amplitude of sad-EMMN component was significantly attenuated in patients with PI, while no remarkable difference was observed under the happy condition. In addition, negative cognitive bias was further validated in the control group, but not presented in the PI group. The current data suggest dysfunctional expressional information processing in PI patients, accompanied by the disorganization of high level perceptual strategy of processing facial emotional expression.