Early Adversity and Emotion Processing From Faces: A Meta-analysis on Behavioral and Neurophysiological Responses

Saarinen, Aino; Keltikangas‐Järvinen, Liisa; Jääskeläinen, Erika; Huhtaniska, Sanna; Pudas, Juho; Tovar-Perdomo, Santiago; Penttilä, Matti; Miettunen, Jouko; Lieslehto, Johannes

doi:10.1016/j.bpsc.2021.01.002

Cited by 20 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 106 publications

(106 reference statements)

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“…These factors may have contributed to different findings compared to earlier studies. On the other hand, the results are in line with the recent meta-analysis showing that early adversity, in general, is associated with a lower accuracy rate on face recognition, especially concerning fearful and happy faces [20].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

“…Research with refugees have further demonstrated that stressful conditions, together with parental mental health problems, have a negative impact on the quality of parent-child interactions and attachment [6,19]. In a broader context, the recent meta-analysis showed that early adversity (including many types of harmful experiences such as abuse, bullying, and social deprivation) relates to alterations in behavioral and neurophysiological processing of facial emotions [20]. However, when directly looking into parenting practices and/or discipline types on emotional processing of a child, no such effects can be found [21][22][23].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The role of maternal trauma and discipline types in emotional processing among Syrian refugee children

Peltonen

Gredebäck

Pollak

et al. 2022

Eur Child Adolesc Psychiatry

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Stressful experiences in armed conflict incur intergenerational effects through parental behaviors with their children. A recent study reported that among Syrian refugee families, mothers’ (but not fathers’) post-traumatic stress (PTS) impacted children’s emotional processing. In this study, we aim to shed further light on this phenomenon by analyzing how the parenting practices in the context of post-traumatic stress confers protection or risk for children’s emotional processing. Participants were 6–18-year-old children (n = 212) and their mothers (n = 94), who fled from Syria and were residing in Turkish communities. We used the computer-based emotional processing task including photos of facial movements typically associated with different emotions to measure children’s capacity for emotional processing. Mothers reported their PTS and the discipline types they use, as well as the contextual factors related to their refugee background. Linear mixed effect models were constructed first, to find out the discipline types that are most strongly associated with emotional processing of the child, and second, to examine whether these discipline types moderate the effect of maternal PTS on children's emotional processing. Finally, generalized linear models were constructed to examine which contextual factors are associated with the use of these discipline types by mothers. We found that spanking as a discipline type was associated with poorer child emotional processing, whereas withholding of media access was associated with better emotional processing. Younger and less religious mothers were more prone to use spanking. The study underlines the need for parenting programs alongside with efforts to address mental health issues among mothers living under armed conflict.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The role of maternal trauma and discipline types in emotional processing among Syrian refugee children

Peltonen

Gredebäck

Pollak

et al. 2022

Eur Child Adolesc Psychiatry

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…A recent meta-analysis by Saarinen et al (2021) examined the effects of early adversity, defined as important stressors encountered before the age of 18 years, on emotion recognition. The meta-analysis combined results from studies conducted with children and adults, with the average age of participants being of approximately 10 years for the behavioral studies, and 20 years for the fMRI studies.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Second, it would have been interesting to transform the current systematic review into a meta-analysis study. To perform the calculations required for a meta-analysis, authors usually set a threshold of a minimum of three articles on the same data type ( Saarinen et al, 2021 ). The current review describes the results of studies with particular attention to the specific populations that were studied and the methodologies used.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Emotion Recognition in Adults With a History of Childhood Maltreatment: A Systematic Review

Bérubé

Turgeon

Blais

et al. 2021

Trauma, Violence, & Abuse

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Child maltreatment has many well-documented lasting effects on children. Among its consequences, it affects children’s recognition of emotions. More and more studies are recognizing the lasting effect that a history of maltreatment can have on emotion recognition. A systematic literature review was conducted to better understand this relationship. The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) protocol was used and four databases were searched, MEDLINE/PubMed, PsycINFO, EMBASE, and FRANCIS, using three cross-referenced key words: child abuse, emotion recognition, and adults. The search process identified 23 studies that met the inclusion criteria. The review highlights the wide variety of measures used to assess child maltreatment as well as the different protocols used to measure emotion recognition. The results indicate that adults with a history of childhood maltreatment show a differentiated reaction to happiness, anger, and fear. Happiness is less detected, whereas negative emotions are recognized more rapidly and at a lower intensity compared to adults not exposed to such traumatic events. Emotion recognition is also related to greater brain activation for the maltreated group. However, the results are less consistent for adults who also have a diagnosis of mental health problems. The systematic review found that maltreatment affects the perception of emotions expressed on both adult and child faces. However, more research is needed to better understand how a history of maltreatment is related to adults’ perception of children’s emotions.

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“…For socio-affective stimuli, we used photographs of faces expressing negative emotions: fear, anger, and sadness. We used images of negative emotions because evidence suggests that negative emotional stimuli activates the amygdala with higher probability ( Costafreda et al, 2008 ), and because individuals with a history of early adversity react to sad faces with heightened bilateral amygdala activity compared to other facial emotions ( Saarinen et al, 2021 ). Furthermore, it has been reported that abused children have a recognition bias for negative expressions, and that neglected children have a shorter reaction time for recognition of negative facial expressions ( Assed et al, 2020 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Childhood maltreatment results in altered deactivation of reward processing circuits in depressed patients: A functional magnetic resonance imaging study of a facial emotion recognition task

Nagy

Kürtös

Németh

et al. 2021

Neurobiology of Stress

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Importance and objectives Childhood adversity is a strong risk factor for the development of various psychopathologies including major depressive disorder (MDD). However, not all depressed patients experience early life trauma. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies using facial emotion processing tasks have documented altered blood-oxygen-level-dependent (BOLD) responses in specific cortico-limbic networks both in MDD patients and in individuals with a history of childhood maltreatment (CM). Therefore, a history of maltreatment may represent a key modulating factor responsible for the altered processing of socio-affective stimuli. To test this hypothesis, we recruited MDD patients with and without of maltreatment history to study the long-term consequences of childhood trauma and examined the impact of CM on brain activity using a facial emotion recognition fMRI task. Methods MDD patients with childhood maltreatment (MDD + CM, n = 21), MDD patients without maltreatment (MDD, n = 19), and healthy controls ( n = 21) matched for age, sex and intelligence quotient underwent fMRI while performing a block design facial emotion matching task with images portraying negative emotions (fear, anger and sadness). The history of maltreatment was assessed with the 28-item Childhood Trauma Questionnaire. Results Both MDD and MDD + CM patients displayed impaired accuracy to recognize sad faces. Analysis of brain activity revealed that MDD + CM patients had significantly reduced negative BOLD signals in their right accumbens, subcallosal cortex, and anterior paracingulate gyrus compared to controls. Furthermore, MDD + CM patients had a significantly increased negative BOLD response in their right precentral and postcentral gyri compared to controls. We found little difference between MDD and MDD + CM patients, except that MDD + CM patients had reduced negative BOLD response in their anterior paracingulate gyrus relative to the MDD group. Conclusions Our present data provide evidence that depressed patients with a history of maltreatment are impaired in facial emotion recognition and that they display altered functioning of key reward-related fronto-striatal circuits during a facial emotion matching task.

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Early Adversity and Emotion Processing From Faces: A Meta-analysis on Behavioral and Neurophysiological Responses

Cited by 20 publications

References 106 publications

The role of maternal trauma and discipline types in emotional processing among Syrian refugee children

The role of maternal trauma and discipline types in emotional processing among Syrian refugee children

Emotion Recognition in Adults With a History of Childhood Maltreatment: A Systematic Review

Childhood maltreatment results in altered deactivation of reward processing circuits in depressed patients: A functional magnetic resonance imaging study of a facial emotion recognition task

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