Emotion perception in old age and dementia

1
Emotion perception in old age and dementia

• Louise Phillips, Vasiliki Orgeta Clare Scott
• School of Psychology, University of Aberdeen.
• Acknowledgements
• Alzheimers Research Trust
• Donald Mowat Stephen Bell, Grampian NHS Trust
• Shelley Channon, UCL.

2
Ekman faces emotion labelling task

• Standardised stimuli.
• Widely used in cross-cultural and
  neuropsychological studies.

DISGUST HAPPINESS SADNESS FEAR ANGER SURPRISE?
3
Meta-analysis of age effects on emotion
labellingRuffman et al. (in prep)

• Age difference in identifying
• Negative emotions of anger, sadness, fear.
• No age difference in identifying
• Surprise, happiness, disgust.
• Positivity? Ceiling effects?

4
Outline of talk

• Normal aging and Alzheimers Disease cause
  impairments of emotion labelling.
• Why?
• Because of high cognitive load of the task?
• Reduce cognitive load of task
• Because of visual perceptual declines?
• Vary intensity of emotion
• Relationship with face identity perception.

5
Cognitive components of emotion labelling

• Labelling emotions
• Rapid perceptual processing of valence
• Decision-making process which label is best
• Likely that decision-making process loads working
  memory
• Phillips et al. (under review) tested role of
  working memory in emotion perception using dual
  task methodology.

6
Dual task effects on emotion labelling and
discrimination. Phillips et al. (under review)
DISGUST HAPPINESS SADNESS FEAR ANGER SURPRISE?
   SAME  or  DIFFERENT emotion?
7
Age effects on emotion discrimination task
MacPherson, Phillips Della Sala (2007)

• Looked at age effects on emotion labelling and
  discrimination tasks
• Size of age effects
• Labelling eta squared .28
• Discrimination eta squared .33
• Age differences in emotion perception not caused
  by working memory demands of task

8
Age and visual cues in emotion perception Orgeta
Phillips (in press)

• Reduce intensity of emotion portrayed.
• Particularly impair older adults?
• Also remove ceiling effects on happiness
• Are age differences in emotion perception related
  to identity perception?
• Benton Facial Recognition Test

9
Effects of intensity on age differences in
labelling happy and sad faces Orgeta Phillips
(in press)
10
Summary of aging effects on emotion perception

• Old impaired labelling sadness, anger and fear
• No difference in age effect for less intense
  emotions
• Age impairments on face identity perception
• But unrelated to age declines in emotion
  perception
• Older adults equally impaired on emotion
  labelling and discrimination
• Age differences not due to working memory load

11
Effects of Alzheimers Disease (AD) on emotion
perception
12
Sample
12
13
Methods emotion/face tasks
  SAME  or  DIFFERENT emotion?
Emotion discrimination
Identity recognition
13
14
Emotion labelling AD v control
14
15
Emotion labelling versus discrimination.
16
Intensity effects on emotion perception

• Saw faces at 75 and 100 intensity
• For each, asked to label emotion
• No interaction between group and intensity.
• E.g. AD patients good at identifying happiness
  and disgust even at 75 intensity.
• AD impaired on face identity perception
• But unrelated to emotion perception

17
Summary of AD effects

• AD impairs labelling of
• Anger, sadness, fear, surprise
• Size of effect same for less intense emotions
• Impaired emotion perception in AD not explained
  by
• Cognitive load of task
• Identity perception

18
Young, old and AD on emotion perceptionHenry et
al. (in prep.)
19
Conclusions

• Age and AD effects on emotion perception
• Not explained by working memory load of task
• Not influenced by intensity of emotional
  expression
• Unrelated to identity perception
• Why is disgust spared?
• Neuropsychological explanation dependent on
  basal ganglia rather than temporal/frontal
  regions?

20
Emotion perception in old age and dementia

• Louise Phillips, Vasiliki Orgeta Clare Scott
• School of Psychology, University of Aberdeen.
• Acknowledgements
• Alzheimers Research Trust
• Donald Mowat Stephen Bell
• Shelley Channon

21
Age and visual cues in emotion perception

• Benton Facial Recognition Test