Deficits in facial emotion perception in recently traumatically brain injured adults

The impaired ability to recognize emotion in faces (for example, an inability to distinguish a fearful face from an angry face) has significant implications for social and occupational functioning. To date, such impairments have been investigated primarily in neurological populations with focal lesions, but not in traumatic brain injury. In the present study, a group of recently traumatically brain-injured adults (N ¼ 17) were assessed for deficits in facial emotion perception using the Florida Affect Battery-Revised. The group was significantly
impaired on all facial emotion perception tasks relative to a neutral control task, when compared to an age and education matched control group. The present findings have clinical implications; they also provide preliminary evidence for the role of diffuse axonal injury in facial emotion perception.