Harmer Catherine J, Grayson Louise, Goodwin Guy M
University Department of Psychiatry, Warneford Hospital, Oxford OX3 7JX, UK.
Biol Psychiatry. 2002 Feb 15;51(4):298-304. doi: 10.1016/s0006-3223(01)01249-5.
Bipolar disorder is associated with functional and structural abnormalities in the brain circuits involved in processing emotional stimuli. Although impairments of cognitive function have been found to persist in bipolar patients during periods of euthymic mood, it is not known whether abnormalities in emotional processing also occur during these periods of recovery.
The present investigation assessed the ability of euthymic patients with bipolar disorder to recognize different facial expressions of emotion, compared with matched controls. A nonemotional facial categorization task was used to control for possible nonspecific differences in perception or attention.
In contrast to the small impairments seen in the nonemotional categorization task, patients with bipolar disorder showed a robust facilitation in the discrimination of disgusted facial expressions. The recognition of other basic negative and positive emotions was unchanged.
The present results suggest a selective facilitation of the processes involved in recognizing facial expressions of disgust in patients with bipolar disorder. This difference in perception may be relevant to the decreased self-esteem and social functioning that have been associated with the euthymic phase of this disorder.
双相情感障碍与参与处理情绪刺激的脑回路中的功能和结构异常有关。尽管已发现双相情感障碍患者在心境正常期间认知功能障碍持续存在，但尚不清楚在这些恢复期间情绪处理异常是否也会出现。
本研究评估了双相情感障碍心境正常患者识别不同情绪面部表情的能力，并与匹配的对照组进行比较。使用非情绪化面部分类任务来控制感知或注意力方面可能存在的非特异性差异。
与非情绪化分类任务中观察到的微小损伤不同，双相情感障碍患者在辨别厌恶面部表情方面表现出明显的促进作用。对其他基本负面和正面情绪的识别没有变化。
目前的结果表明，双相情感障碍患者在识别厌恶面部表情所涉及的过程中存在选择性促进作用。这种感知差异可能与该障碍心境正常期相关的自尊降低和社交功能受损有关。
