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Emotion Processing (emotion + processing)
Selected AbstractsFunctional Brain Mapping of Extraversion and Neuroticism: Learning From Individual Differences in Emotion ProcessingJOURNAL OF PERSONALITY, Issue 6 2004Turhan Canli Studies using functional magnetic resonance imaging have shown that individual differences in participants' E and N scores are correlated with individual differences in brain activation in specific brain regions that are engaged during cognitive-affective tasks. Imaging studies using genotyped participants have begun to address the molecular mechanisms that may underlie these individual differences. The multidisciplinary integration of brain imaging and molecular genetic methods offers an exciting and novel approach for investigators who seek to uncover the biological mechanisms by which personality and health are interrelated. [source] Gender-specific disruptions in emotion processing in younger adults with depression,DEPRESSION AND ANXIETY, Issue 2 2009Sara L. Wright Ph.D. Abstract Background: One of the principal theories regarding the biological basis of major depressive disorder (MDD) implicates a dysregulation of emotion-processing circuitry. Gender differences in how emotions are processed and relative experience with emotion processing might help to explain some of the disparities in the prevalence of MDD between women and men. This study sought to explore how gender and depression status relate to emotion processing. Methods: This study employed a 2 (MDD status) × 2 (gender) factorial design to explore differences in classifications of posed facial emotional expressions (N=151). Results: For errors, there was an interaction between gender and depression status. Women with MDD made more errors than did nondepressed women and men with MDD, particularly for fearful and sad stimuli (Ps <.02), which they were likely to misinterpret as angry (Ps <.04). There was also an interaction of diagnosis and gender for response cost for negative stimuli, with significantly greater interference from negative faces present in women with MDD compared to nondepressed women (P=.01). Men with MDD, conversely, performed similarly to control men (P=.61). Conclusions: These results provide novel and intriguing evidence that depression in younger adults (<35 years) differentially disrupts emotion processing in women as compared to men. This interaction could be driven by neurobiological and social learning mechanisms, or interactions between them, and may underlie differences in the prevalence of depression in women and men. Depression and Anxiety, 2009. Published 2008 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] Serotonergic genes modulate amygdala activity in major depressionGENES, BRAIN AND BEHAVIOR, Issue 7 2007U. Dannlowski Serotonergic genes have been implicated in the pathogenesis of depression probably via their influence on neural activity during emotion processing. This study used an imaging genomics approach to investigate amygdala activity in major depression as a function of common functional polymorphisms in the serotonin transporter gene (5-HTTLPR) and the serotonin receptor 1A gene (5-HT1A -1019C/G). In 27 medicated patients with major depression, amygdala responses to happy, sad and angry faces were assessed using functional magnetic resonance imaging at 3 Tesla. Patients were genotyped for the 5-HT1A -1019C/G and the 5-HTTLPR polymorphism, including the newly described 5-HTT-rs25531 single nucleotide polymorphism. Risk allele carriers for either gene showed significantly increased bilateral amygdala activation in response to emotional stimuli, implicating an additive effect of both genotypes. Our data suggest that the genetic susceptibility for major depression might be transported via dysfunctional neural activity in brain regions critical for emotion processing. [source] Social cognition and the brain: A meta-analysisHUMAN BRAIN MAPPING, Issue 3 2009Frank Van Overwalle Abstract This meta-analysis explores the location and function of brain areas involved in social cognition, or the capacity to understand people's behavioral intentions, social beliefs, and personality traits. On the basis of over 200 fMRI studies, it tests alternative theoretical proposals that attempt to explain how several brain areas process information relevant for social cognition. The results suggest that inferring temporary states such as goals, intentions, and desires of other people,even when they are false and unjust from our own perspective,strongly engages the temporo-parietal junction (TPJ). Inferring more enduring dispositions of others and the self, or interpersonal norms and scripts, engages the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), although temporal states can also activate the mPFC. Other candidate tasks reflecting general-purpose brain processes that may potentially subserve social cognition are briefly reviewed, such as sequence learning, causality detection, emotion processing, and executive functioning (action monitoring, attention, dual task monitoring, episodic memory retrieval), but none of them overlaps uniquely with the regions activated during social cognition. Hence, it appears that social cognition particularly engages the TPJ and mPFC regions. The available evidence is consistent with the role of a TPJ-related mirror system for inferring temporary goals and intentions at a relatively perceptual level of representation, and the mPFC as a module that integrates social information across time and allows reflection and representation of traits and norms, and presumably also of intentionality, at a more abstract cognitive level. Hum Brain Mapp, 2009. © 2008 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] Neural systems connecting interoceptive awareness and feelingsHUMAN BRAIN MAPPING, Issue 1 2007Olga Pollatos Abstract In many theories of emotions the representations of bodily responses play an important role for subjective feelings. We tested the hypothesis that the perception of bodily states is positively related to the experienced intensity of feelings as well as to the activity of first-order and second-order brain structures involved in the processing of feelings. Using a heartbeat perception task, subjects were separated into groups with either high or poor interoceptive awareness. During emotional picture presentation we measured high-density EEG and used spatiotemporal current density reconstruction to identify regions involved in both interoceptive awareness and emotion processing. We observed a positive relation between interoceptive awareness and the experienced intensity of emotions. Furthermore, the P300 amplitudes to pleasant and unpleasant pictures were enhanced for subjects with high interoceptive awareness. The source reconstruction revealed that interoceptive awareness is related to an enhanced activation in both first-order structures (insula, somatosensory cortices) and second-order structures (anterior cingulate, prefrontal cortices). We conclude that the perception of bodily states is a crucial determinant for the processing and the subjective experience of feelings. Hum. Brain Mapping, 2007. © 2006 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] Shyness and emotion-processing skills in preschoolers: a 6-month longitudinal studyINFANT AND CHILD DEVELOPMENT, Issue 2 2008Paul S. Strand Abstract The present study utilized a short-term longitudinal research design to examine the hypothesis that shyness in preschoolers is differentially related to different aspects of emotion processing. Using teacher reports of shyness and performance measures of emotion processing, including (1) facial emotion recognition, (2) non-facial emotion recognition, and (3) emotional perspective-taking, we examined 337 Head Start attendees twice at a 24-week interval. Results revealed significant concurrent and longitudinal relationships between shyness and facial emotion recognition, and either minimal or non-existent relationships between shyness and the other aspects of emotion processing. Correlational analyses of concurrent assessments revealed that shyness predicted poorer facial emotion recognition scores for negative emotions (sad, angry, and afraid), but not a positive emotion (happy). Analyses of change over time, on the other hand, revealed that shyness predicted change in facial emotion recognition scores for all four measured emotions. Facial emotion recognition scores did not predict changes in shyness. Results are discussed with respect to expanding the scope of research on shyness and emotion processing to include time-dependent studies that allow for the specification of developmental processes. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Social Cognitive and Emotion Processing Abilities of Children With Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders: A Comparison With Attention Deficit Hyperactivity DisorderALCOHOLISM, Issue 10 2009Rachel L. Greenbaum Background:, Although children with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASDs) are at high risk of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), direct comparisons show distinct cognitive phenotypes in the 2 diagnoses. However, these groups have not been directly compared for social problems or social cognition, nor has social cognition been directly examined in FASDs. Objectives:, To compare FASDs and ADHD groups on social cognition tasks and determine whether deficient social cognition and emotion processing predict behavioral problems and social skills. Methods:, Studied were 33 children with FASDs, 30 with ADHD, and 34 normal controls (NC). All received tasks of social cognition and emotion processing. Parents and teachers rated children on measures of completed questionnaires assessing child's behavioral problems and social skills using the Child Behavior Checklist, Teacher Report Form, and Social Skills Rating Scale. Children received 3 subtests from the Saltzman-Benaiah and Lalonde (2007) Theory of Mind Task as a measure of social cognition and 4 subtests from the Minnesota Test of Affective Processing (Lai et al., 1991) to assess emotion processing. Results:, Parents and teachers reported more behavior problems and poorer social skills in children in FASD and ADHD than NC groups. FASDs demonstrated significantly weaker social cognition and facial emotion processing ability than ADHD and NC groups. Regression analyses identified social cognition as a significant predictor of behavior problems and emotion processing as a significant predictor of social skills. Conclusions:, Children with FASDs show a distinct behavioral profile from children with ADHD. Difficulties in social cognition and emotion processing in children with FASDs may contribute to their high incidence of social behavioral problems. [source] Specificity of regional brain activity in anxiety types during emotion processingPSYCHOPHYSIOLOGY, Issue 3 2007Anna S. Engels Abstract The present study tested the hypothesis that anxious apprehension involves more left- than right-hemisphere activity and that anxious arousal is associated with the opposite pattern. Behavioral and fMRI responses to threat stimuli in an emotional Stroop task were examined in nonpatient groups reporting anxious apprehension, anxious arousal, or neither. Reaction times were longer for negative than for neutral words. As predicted, brain activation distinguished anxious groups in a left inferior frontal region associated with speech production and in a right-hemisphere inferior temporal area. Addressing a second hypothesis about left-frontal involvement in emotion, distinct left frontal regions were associated with anxious apprehension versus processing of positive information. Results support the proposed distinction between the two types of anxiety and resolve an inconsistency about the role of left-frontal activation in emotion and psychopathology. [source] Annotation: Development of facial expression recognition from childhood to adolescence: behavioural and neurological perspectivesTHE JOURNAL OF CHILD PSYCHOLOGY AND PSYCHIATRY AND ALLIED DISCIPLINES, Issue 7 2004Catherine Herba Background:, Intact emotion processing is critical for normal emotional development. Recent advances in neuroimaging have facilitated the examination of brain development, and have allowed for the exploration of the relationships between the development of emotion processing abilities, and that of associated neural systems. Methods:, A literature review was performed of published studies examining the development of emotion expression recognition in normal children and psychiatric populations, and of the development of neural systems important for emotion processing. Results:, Few studies have explored the development of emotion expression recognition throughout childhood and adolescence. Behavioural studies suggest continued development throughout childhood and adolescence (reflected by accuracy scores and speed of processing), which varies according to the category of emotion displayed. Factors such as sex, socio-economic status, and verbal ability may also affect this development. Functional neuroimaging studies in adults highlight the role of the amygdala in emotion processing. Results of the few neuroimaging studies in children have focused on the role of the amygdala in the recognition of fearful expressions. Although results are inconsistent, they provide evidence throughout childhood and adolescence for the continued development of and sex differences in amygdalar function in response to fearful expressions. Studies exploring emotion expression recognition in psychiatric populations of children and adolescents suggest deficits that are specific to the type of disorder and to the emotion displayed. Conclusions:, Results from behavioural and neuroimaging studies indicate continued development of emotion expression recognition and neural regions important for this process throughout childhood and adolescence. Methodological inconsistencies and disparate findings make any conclusion difficult, however. Further studies are required examining the relationship between the development of emotion expression recognition and that of underlying neural systems, in particular subcortical and prefrontal cortical structures. These will inform understanding of the neural bases of normal and abnormal emotional development, and aid the development of earlier interventions for children and adolescents with psychiatric disorders. [source] Exploring the role of face processing in facial emotion recognition in schizophreniaACTA NEUROPSYCHIATRICA, Issue 6 2009Paola Rocca Objective: Impairment in emotion perception represents a fundamental feature of schizophrenia with important consequences in social functioning. A fundamental unresolved issue is the relationship between emotion perception and face perception. The aim of the present study was to examine whether facial identity recognition (Identity Discrimination) is a factor predicting facial emotion recognition in the context of the other factors, known as contributing to emotion perception, such as cognitive functions and symptoms. Methods: We enrolled 58 stable schizophrenic out-patients and 47 healthy subjects. Facial identity recognition and emotion perception were assessed with the Comprehensive Affect Testing System. Different multiple regression models with backward elimination were performed in order to discover the relation of each significant variable with emotion perception. Results: In a regression including the six significant variables (age, positive symptomatology, Identity Discrimination, attentive functions, verbal memory-learning, executive functions) versus emotion processing, only attentive functions (standardised , = 0.264, p = 0.038) and Identity Discrimination (standardised , = 0.279, p = 0.029) reached a significant level. Two partial regressions were performed including five variables, one excluding attentive functions and the other excluding Identity Discrimination. When we excluded attentive functions, the only significant variable was Identity Discrimination (standardised , = 0.278, p = 0.032). When we excluded Identity Discrimination, both verbal memory-learning (standardised , = 0.261, p = 0.042) and executive functions (standardised , = 0.253, p = 0.048) were significant. Conclusions: Our results emphasised the role of face perception and attentional abilities on affect perception in schizophrenia. We additionally found a role of verbal memory-learning and executive functions on emotion perception. The relationship between those above-mentioned variables and emotion processing could have implications for cognitive rehabilitation. [source] | ||||||||||||||||