How does visual context influence recognition of facial emotion in people with traumatic brain injury?

The current study assessed recognition of facial emotional stimuli following traumatic brain injury (TBI) and examined whether performance may be influenced by emotional visual scenes. Thirty-five patients with moderate-to-severe TBI and 55 matched controls completed the novel Angers Facial Expression in Context Task (AFECT), designed to examine recognition of facial expressions of basic emotions in both congruent and incongruent emotional visual contexts. In comparison with non-brain damaged adults, patients with TBI performed more poorly and slowly on both contextual conditions (congruent vs. incongruent) of the AFECT. Taken together, these results raise the possibility that adults with TBI may not fully benefit from supportive contextual cues. Also, they stress the importance of using emotional stimuli that better capture affect processing in real-world contexts and open up new avenues to better understand negative social outcomes in patients with TBI.