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Are paranoid schizophrenia patients really more accurate than other people at recognizing spontaneous expressions of negative emotion? A study of the putative association between emotion recognition and thinking errors in paranoia

St-Hilaire, Annie
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1215450307

Abstract Details

2008, PHD, Kent State University, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Psychological Sciences.
Impairments in facial affect recognition have been linked to schizophrenia. Recent studies suggest that the degree of impairment varies as a function of clinical subtype. Paranoid patients have been found to be more accurate than nonparanoid patients at recognizing posed and spontaneous facial expressions of negative emotion, and more accurate even than nonpsychiatric controls at identifying spontaneous expressions of negative emotions. This is noteworthy given that spontaneous expressions are generally less intense and more ambiguous than posed expressions of emotion. No studies, however, have attempted to explicate this finding. The main objectives of the present investigation, therefore, were to replicate this finding and test the hypothesis that cognitive biases associated with psychosis cause paranoid patients to interpret ambiguous expressions of emotion as more negative than others. To do so, 24 paranoid schizophrenia patients, 26 nonparanoid schizophrenia patients, and 29 control participants completed an emotion recognition task as well as measures of attentional and referential biases consisting of a probabilistic reasoning task, an attribution style questionnaire, a theory of mind task, and an emotional Stroop task. Contrary to expectations, impairments in the recognition of posed and spontaneous expressions of emotion were found in both the paranoid and nonparanoid schizophrenia groups. Furthermore, although paranoid patients' performance on some of the cognitive measures was suggestive of biased processing of ambiguous information, thinking errors did not predict accurate recognition of spontaneous expressions of negative emotions. IQ was the only significant predictor of performance on the recognition of spontaneous expressions of negative emotion. Results therefore suggest that, regardless of subtype, stable schizophrenia outpatients have more difficulty recognizing facial expressions of negative emotion in others than nonpsychiatric controls. Emotion recognition deficits may be better explained by impairments in general cognitive abilities than specific biased processing of ambiguous and threatening information.
Nancy Docherty, PhD (Committee Chair)
Deborah Barnbaum, PhD (Committee Member)
Steven Brown, PhD (Committee Member)
William Merriman, PhD (Committee Member)
John Updegraff, PhD (Committee Member)
203 p.
Psychology
schizophrenia; paranoia; emotion recognition; posed expressions; spontaneous expressions; cognition

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • St-Hilaire, A. (2008). Are paranoid schizophrenia patients really more accurate than other people at recognizing spontaneous expressions of negative emotion? A study of the putative association between emotion recognition and thinking errors in paranoia [Doctoral dissertation, Kent State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1215450307

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • St-Hilaire, Annie. Are paranoid schizophrenia patients really more accurate than other people at recognizing spontaneous expressions of negative emotion? A study of the putative association between emotion recognition and thinking errors in paranoia. 2008. Kent State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1215450307.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • St-Hilaire, Annie. "Are paranoid schizophrenia patients really more accurate than other people at recognizing spontaneous expressions of negative emotion? A study of the putative association between emotion recognition and thinking errors in paranoia." Doctoral dissertation, Kent State University, 2008. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1215450307

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

kent1215450307
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© 2008, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Kent State University and OhioLINK.