RIGHT-HEMISPHERE EMOTIONAL PERCEPTION - EVIDENCE ACROSS MULTIPLE CHANNELS

Emotional perception was examined in stroke patients across 3 communic ation channels: facial, prosodic, and lexical. Hemispheric specializat ion for emotion was tested via right-hemisphere (RK) and valence hypot heses, and relationships among channels were determined. Participants were 11 right-brain-damaged (RBD), 10 left-brain-damaged (LBD), and 15 demographically matched normal control (NC) adults. Experimental meas ures, with analogous psychometric properties, were identification and discrimination tasks, including a range of positive and negative emoti ons. Nonemotional control tasks were used for each channel. For identi fication, RBDs were significantly impaired relative to LBDs and NCs ac ross channels and valences, supporting the RH hypothesis. No group dif ferences emerged for discrimination. Findings were not influenced by d emographic, clinical, or control variables. Correlations among the cha nnels were more prominent for normal than for brain-damaged groups.