Medizinische Universität Graz - Research portal
Selected Publication:
Jehna, M.
A multidimensional approach using MRI to investigate emotion recognition in multiple sclerosis
[ Dissertation ] Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz; 2011. pp.100.
- Authors Med Uni Graz:
- Jehna Margit
- Advisor:
- Enzinger Christian
- Altmetrics:
- Abstract:
- The ability to recognize emotional facial expressions employs several parallel encoding processes and is crucial for understanding nonverbal social signals. The accuracy of these processes has been shown to be impaired in several neuropsychiatric disorders. Although it is known that Multiple Sclerosis (MS) can have an impact on cognitive and emotional functions, the ability to discriminate emotional facial expressions has rarely been investigated to date. There are a few indications that MS patients have deficits in accurate processing of emotional facial stimuli, but evidence is rare and needs further investigation. In this work we investigated emotion recognition in multiple sclerosis with behavioural and functional methods, considering that MS-specific structural cerebral alterations possibly affect the recognition of emotional facial expressions. We used fMRI to analyse the neural responses to visual facial stimuli in MS affected brains. Based on the assumption that emotion recognition is dependent on the accurate processing of faces per se (facial identity), we supposed that it could be important to investigate both emotional and non-emotional (neutral) face perception. In our first study we investigated behavioural performance upon emotion recognition in MS. The second study was done to evaluate our constructed fMRI paradigm in 30 healthy subjects. In our third study we recruited 15 MS patients and 15 healthy controls to examine behavioural, functional and structural correlates of emotion recognition in multiple sclerosis. The results of our first study indicated that the ability to discriminate emotional facial expressions was partially behaviourally impaired in MS patients and most likely dependent on cognitive performance, especially information processing speed. The results of our second study clearly demonstrated specific and distinct network patterns for emotional and neutral face recognition. Consequently, the fMRI paradigm was proven to be applicable for the further investigation in our clinical population. In our third study, MS patients without emotional dysfunction showed altered network patterns during the implicit recognition of non-emotional and emotional facial expressions. These results were interpreted as compensation mechanisms that are typically seen in MS during cognitive processing tasks. Structural analysis showed that regional micro- and macro-structural cerebral damage might be related to altered brain function. These combined behavioural, functional and structural investigations underscore the complexity of disturbed network function during emotion recognition processes in multiple sclerosis and should serve to stimulate further studies into this neglected area of research.