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The recognition of emotion in the faces and voice of anorexia nervosa
Author(s) -
KucharskaPietura Katarzyna,
Nikolaou Vasilis,
Masiak Marek,
Treasure Janet
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
international journal of eating disorders
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.785
H-Index - 138
eISSN - 1098-108X
pISSN - 0276-3478
DOI - 10.1002/eat.10219
Subject(s) - anorexia nervosa , psychology , facial expression , empathy , affect (linguistics) , developmental psychology , anorexia , eating disorders , audiology , clinical psychology , psychiatry , medicine , communication
Objective The aim of this study was to examine emotional recognition (prosodic and visual) in anorexia nervosa. Methods Thirty people with anorexia nervosa and a comparison group of 30 healthy women were tested with facial and vocal stimuli that expressed specific emotions and they were given a neutral task. Results The group of women with anorexia nervosa was poor at emotional recognition. This was most marked for negative emotions in faces and for both positive and negative emotions in voices. This decreased ability to recognize negative affect in faces remained even after adjustment for confounding variables such as age, education, and depression. Discussion People with anorexia nervosa have difficulty recognizing emotions from facial expression and vocal tone. This may contribute to poor interpersonal communication and a lack of empathy, both of which are associated with anorexia nervosa patients. © 2003 by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J Eat Disord 35: 42–47, 2004.