Impaired Visual Cortical Processing of Affective Facial Information in Schizophrenia

Abstract

Facial emotion perception impairment in schizophrenia is currently viewed as abnormal affective processing. Facial emotion perception also relies on visual processing. Yet, visual cortical processing of facial emotion is not well understood in this disorder. We measured perceptual thresholds for detecting facial fear and happiness in patients (n=23) and controls (n=23), and adjusted emotion intensity of facial stimuli (via morphing between images of neutral and emotive expressions) for each subject. We then evaluated activations of the visual cortex and amygdala during the performance of perceptually-equated facial emotion detection tasks. Patients had significantly lower fear- and happiness-induced activations in the visual cortex and amygdala. Activations between the visual cortex and amygdala were largely correlated, but the correlations in patients occurred abnormally early in response time course during fear perception. In schizophrenia, visual processing of facial emotion is deficient and visual and affective processing of negative facial emotion may be prematurely associated.

Masked ambiguity – Emotion identification in schizophrenia and major depressive disorder

“…Eye-tracking methods, in particular, provide the opportunity to identify (aberrant) visual exploration paths in patients with schizophrenia and might thus find abnormal eye movement when scanning the mask in contrast to healthy controls or other patient groups (Loughland et al, 2002). Moreover, emotion identification in morphed faces investigated with functional neuroimaging methods suggested that sensitivity of emotion identification was altered in patients with schizophrenia (Maher et al, 2016).…”

The correlation between fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation-based resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging and facial emotion recognition ability in patients with first-episode schizophrenia

“…As the core brain region of facial emotion cognition, the function of the AMY is similar in Schizophrenia, as indicated in a meta-analysis showing reduced AMY activation in response to facial emotion processing in Schizophrenia (Gur et al 2002). Maher et al concluded that patients with Schizophrenia had signi cantly lower neural activity by activation in the AMY fearful and happy faces (Maher et al 2016). Similar results were obtained by Wang et al in Schizophrenia patients with high negative symptoms (Wang et al 2018), and they found decreased functional connectivity between the AMY and the ventral medial prefrontal cortex and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex.…”

The correlation between fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation-based resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging and facial emotion recognition ability in patients with first-episode schizophrenia

“…Maher et al 34 concluded that patients with schizophrenia had signi cantly lower neural activity by activation in the AMY fearful and happy faces. Similar results were obtained by Wang et al in schizophrenia patients with high negative symptoms 35 , and they found decreased functional connectivity between the AMY and the ventral medial prefrontal cortex and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex.…”