Highlights
- •Elderly with MCI have a diminished ability to discriminate facial emotions.
- •Elderly with MCI process EFEs worse than healthy individuals.
- •EFEs's valence and intensity seem to play a prominent role in emotional processing.
- •MCI individuals seem to be affected emotional processing neurological substrates.
- •Emotional processing seems to be crucial in attentional resource intervention.
Abstract
We studied the ability of individuals with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) to process
emotional facial expressions (EFEs). To date, no systematic study has addressed how
variation in intensity affects recognition of the different type of EFEs in such subjects.
Design
Two groups of 50 elderly subjects, 50 healthy individuals and 50 with MCI, completed
a task that involved identifying 180 EFEs prepared using virtual models. Two features
of the EFEs were contemplated, their valence (operationalized in six basic emotions)
and five levels of intensity.
Results
At all levels of intensity, elderly individuals with MCI were significantly worse
at identifying each EFE than healthy subjects. Some emotions were easier to identify
than others, with happiness proving to be the easiest to identify and disgust the
hardest, and intensity influenced the identification of the EFEs (the stronger the
intensity, the greater the number of correct identifications). Overall, elderly individuals
with MCI had a poorer capacity to process EFEs, suggesting that cognitive ability
modulates the processing of emotions, where features of such stimuli also seem to
play a prominent role (e.g., valence and intensity). Thus, the neurological substrates
involved in emotional processing appear to be affected by MCI.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: July 23, 2015
Accepted:
July 22,
2015
Received in revised form:
June 17,
2015
Received:
March 16,
2015
Identification
Copyright
© 2015 Elsevier B.V. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
