Facial affect and affective prosody recognition in first-episode schizophrenia

Individuals with schizophrenia experience problems in the perception of emo tional material; however, the specificity, extent, and nature of the defici ts are unclear. Facial affect and affective prosody recognition were examin ed in representative samples of individuals with first-episode psychosis, a ssessed as outpatients during the early recovery phase of illness, and non- patients. Perception tasks were selected to allow examination of emotion ca tegory results across face and voice modalities. Facial tasks were computer ised modifications of the Feinberg et al. procedure (Feinberg, T.E., Rifkin , A., Schaffer, C., Walker, E., 1986. Arch. Gen. Psychiatry 43, 276-279). P rosody tasks were developed using four professional actors, and item select ions were based on responses of undergraduates. Participant groups did not differ in their understanding of the words used to describe emotions. Findi ngs supported small but consistent deficits in recognition of fear and sadn ess across both communication channels for the combined schizophrenia (n = 29) and other psychotic disorders (n = 28) groups as compared to the affect ive psychoses (n = 23) and non-patients (n = 24). A diagnostic effect was e vident that was independent of the contribution of intelligence. The detect ion of emotion recognition impairments in first-episode schizophrenia sugge sts a trait deficit. The pattern of results is consistent with amygdala dys function in schizophrenia and related psychoses. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.