Processing Emotional Facial Expressions in Individuals with Post-traumatic Stress Symptom: An ERP Study

초록

The present study aimed to demonstrate the neural mechanisms that relate to the abnormal processing of facial expressions in individuals with post-traumatic stress symptom (PTSS). In particular, we investigated each processing stage's influence on facial expression recognition in individuals with PTSS. To investigate these mechanisms, we measured behavioral performances and event-related potentials (ERPs) as individuals performed a multi-morphed facial expression identification task. Participants were divided into two groups: those with PTSS and a control group without PTSS. Participants viewed representations of fearful, neutral, and happy facial expressions. ERP results revealed that, relative to the control group, the PTSS experience group experienced enhanced P1 amplitudes (reflecting rapid detection) and attenuated LPP amplitudes (reflecting later strategic processing) for all facial expressions. The behavioral data show that PTSS experience group committed more errors and were slower at detectingfacial expressions than were the controls. The difficulties individuals with PTSS face in recognizing facial expressions are explained by abnormal processing related to sustained attention or elaborating processing deficit.

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