Deficits in facial emotional valence processing in older people with subjective memory complaints: Behavioral and electrophysiological evidence

Abstract

Subjective memory complaints (SMCs), which occur in the absence of clinical memory deficits, may precede mild cognitive impairment (MCI) or Alzheimer's disease (AD). Some studies have reported a deficit in facial emotion processing in people with MCI or AD. However, it is unclear whether this deficit is also present in older people with SMCs. The present study used behavioral measurements and event-related potentials (ERPs) to investigate the facial emotion processing of 41 older people with SMCs and 38 without SMCs. The task contained 204 images displaying facial emotions (positive, negative, and neutral). In terms of behavior, our results showed that participants with SMCs were slower and less accurate than controls. In terms of ERPs, the N170 latency was longer in men with SMCs than in controls, whereas no differences were observed between groups in the P300 and late positive potential (LPP) latencies or amplitudes. Moreover, in participants with SMCs, higher P300 and LPP amplitudes were related to better performance on working memory, psychomotor speed, and attention. Additionally, women were faster and more accurate than men on the facial emotion-processing task. In sum, these results suggest that older people with SMCs may have deficits in the processing of facial expressions of emotion. However, this deficit seems to affect the structural encoding of faces, rather than the late stages of processing.

EEG markers and subjective memory complaints in young and older people

“…It is worth noting that cut-off points and categorical distinctions are used in clinical procedures and may be helpful to neuropsychologists using this questionnaire. Partial results from the older subsample have been previously reported (Garrido-Chaves et al, 2021;Perez et al, 2021).…”

The Importance of Subjective Cognitive Decline Recognition and the Potential of Molecular and Neurophysiological Biomarkers—A Systematic Review

“…The N170 component, associated with face processing, has been investigated in two studies [ 46 , 47 ]. Lazarou et al [ 46 ] found that the N170 amplitude was reduced in SCD patients compared to controls, with a pattern similar to MCI and AD patients.…”

“…This suggests that face processing may be affected in the early stages of cognitive decline. However, Perez et al [ 47 ] found only significant differences in N170 amplitude or latency between male patients with SCD and male controls. This discrepancy could be due to methodological differences, such as using different emotional valence stimuli.…”

“…Some studies found no significant differences in P300 amplitude or latency between SCD patients and controls [ 17 , 47 , 48 ]. However, Smart et al [ 49 ] found a reduced P300 amplitude in SCD patients, suggesting a decline in attention capacity.…”

Age-related reduction in anxiety and neural encoding of negative emotional memory

“…For instance, individuals with AD display impaired identification of negative facial emotions, inconsistent emotional memory benefit ( Brueckner and Moritz, 2009 ; Klein-Koerkamp et al, 2012 ; Mistridis et al, 2013 ; Cárdenas et al, 2021 ), and inconsistent positivity effect ( Goodkind et al, 2015 ; Zhang et al, 2015 ). People with MCI exhibit impaired negative emotion recognition in people with MCI ( Elferink et al, 2015 ; Morellini et al, 2022 ); and those with SCD show altered facial emotion processing( Perez et al, 2022 ) and emotion dysregulation ( Mah et al, 2021 ). Further, anxiety represents a risk factor of cognitive decline in the elderly ( Pietrzak et al, 2012 ; Santabárbara et al, 2020 ; Gracia-García et al, 2023 ).…”