title: Facial fear processing and psychotic symptoms in schizophrenia: functional magnetic resonance imaging study.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The recognition of negative facial affect is impaired in people with schizophrenia. The neural underpinnings of this deficit and its relationship to the symptoms of psychosis are still unclear.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To examine the association between positive and negative psychotic symptoms and activation within the amygdala and extrastriate visual regions of patients with schizophrenia during fearful and neutral facial expression processing.
  
  
  METHODS
  Functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to measure neural responses to neutral and fearful facial expressions in 11 patients with schizophrenia and 9 healthy volunteers during an implicit emotional task.
  
  
  RESULTS
  No association between amygdala activation and positive symptoms was found; the activation within the left superior temporal gyrus was negatively associated with the negative symptoms of the patients.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our results indicate an association between impaired extrastriate visual processing of facial fear and negative symptoms, which may underlie the previously reported difficulties of patients with negative symptoms in the recognition of facial fear.
authors.affiliation: CSI Lab, Department of Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London, De Crespigny Park, London SE5 8AF, UK. spdppam@iop.kcl.ac.uk
authors.forename: Panayiota G
authors.initials: PG
authors.lastname: Michalopoulou
authors.forename: Simon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Surguladze
authors.forename: Lucy A
authors.initials: LA
authors.lastname: Morley
authors.forename: Vincent P
authors.initials: VP
authors.lastname: Giampietro
authors.forename: Robin M
authors.initials: RM
authors.lastname: Murray
authors.forename: Sukhwinder S
authors.initials: SS
authors.lastname: Shergill
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000679:Amygdala / Q000503:physiopathology; D001931:Brain Mapping / Q000379:methods; D005149:Facial Expression; D005239:Fear; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000503:physiopathology*; D012565:Schizophrenic Psychology; D012938:Social Perception; D013702:Temporal Lobe / Q000503:physiopathology