Effects of childhood trauma on facial recognition of fear in psychosis

Abstract

Introduction: Childhood trauma has been reported as a risk factor for psychosis. Different types of traumatic experiences in childhood could lead to different clinical manifestations in psychotic disorders.

Material and methods: We studied differences in social cognition (emotion recognition and theory of mind) and clinical symptoms in a sample of 62 patients with psychosis (less than 5 years of illness) and childhood trauma, analysing performance by trauma type.

Results: Psychotic patients with a history of childhood trauma other than sexual abuse were more capable of recognizing fear as a facial emotion (especially when facial stimuli were non-degraded) than participants with a history of sexual abuse or with no history of childhood trauma (P=.008). We also found that the group that had suffered sexual abuse did not show improvement in fear recognition when exposed to clearer stimuli, although this intergroup difference did not reach statistical significance (P=.064). We have not found other differences between abuse groups, neither in clinical symptoms (PANSS factors) nor in Hinting Task scores.

Conclusion: We have found differences in fear recognition among patients with psychotic disorders who have experienced different types of childhood trauma.

Keywords: Cognición social; Esquizofrenia; Psychotic disorders; Schizophrenia; Social cognition; Trastornos psicóticos; Trauma; Trauma infantil.