Abnormal Emotional Processing and Emotional Experience in Patients with Peripheral Facial Nerve Paralysis: An MEG Study

Kheirkhah, Mina; Brodoehl, Stefan; Leistritz, Lutz; Götz, Theresa; Baumbach, Philipp; Huonker, Ralph; Witte, Otto W.; Volk, Gerd Fabian; Guntinas-Lichius, Orlando; Klingner, Carsten M.

doi:10.3390/brainsci10030147

Open AccessArticle

Abnormal Emotional Processing and Emotional Experience in Patients with Peripheral Facial Nerve Paralysis: An MEG Study

by

Mina Kheirkhah

¹,

Stefan Brodoehl

^1,2,

Lutz Leistritz

³,

Theresa Götz

^1,3,

Philipp Baumbach

⁴,

Ralph Huonker

¹,

Otto W. Witte

²,

Gerd Fabian Volk

⁵,

Orlando Guntinas-Lichius

⁵

and

Carsten M. Klingner

^1,2,*

¹

Biomagnetic Center, Jena University Hospital, 07747 Jena, Germany

²

Hans Berger Department of Neurology, Jena University Hospital, 07747 Jena, Germany

³

Institute of Medical Statistics, Computer and Data Sciences, Jena University Hospital, 07740 Jena, Germany

⁴

Department of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine, Jena University Hospital, 07747 Jena, Germany

⁵

Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Jena University Hospital, 07747 Jena, Germany

^*

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.

Brain Sci. 2020, 10(3), 147; https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci10030147

Submission received: 4 February 2020 / Revised: 27 February 2020 / Accepted: 2 March 2020 / Published: 4 March 2020

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Brain Computer Interfaces and Emotional Involvement: Theory, Research, and Applications)

Download

Browse Figures

Versions Notes

Abstract

Abnormal emotional reactions of the brain in patients with facial nerve paralysis have not yet been reported. This study aims to investigate this issue by applying a machine-learning algorithm that discriminates brain emotional activities that belong either to patients with facial nerve paralysis or to healthy controls. Beyond this, we assess an emotion rating task to determine whether there are differences in their experience of emotions. MEG signals of 17 healthy controls and 16 patients with facial nerve paralysis were recorded in response to picture stimuli in three different emotional categories (pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral). The selected machine learning technique in this study was the logistic regression with LASSO regularization. We demonstrated significant classification performances in all three emotional categories. The best classification performance was achieved considering features based on event-related fields in response to the pleasant category, with an accuracy of 0.79 (95% CI (0.70, 0.82)). We also found that patients with facial nerve paralysis rated pleasant stimuli significantly more positively than healthy controls. Our results indicate that the inability to express facial expressions due to peripheral motor paralysis of the face might cause abnormal brain emotional processing and experience of particular emotions.

Keywords: classification; emotion; facial nerve paralysis; LASSO; MEG

Share and Cite

MDPI and ACS Style

Kheirkhah, M.; Brodoehl, S.; Leistritz, L.; Götz, T.; Baumbach, P.; Huonker, R.; Witte, O.W.; Volk, G.F.; Guntinas-Lichius, O.; Klingner, C.M. Abnormal Emotional Processing and Emotional Experience in Patients with Peripheral Facial Nerve Paralysis: An MEG Study. Brain Sci. 2020, 10, 147. https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci10030147

AMA Style

Kheirkhah M, Brodoehl S, Leistritz L, Götz T, Baumbach P, Huonker R, Witte OW, Volk GF, Guntinas-Lichius O, Klingner CM. Abnormal Emotional Processing and Emotional Experience in Patients with Peripheral Facial Nerve Paralysis: An MEG Study. Brain Sciences. 2020; 10(3):147. https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci10030147

Chicago/Turabian Style

Kheirkhah, Mina, Stefan Brodoehl, Lutz Leistritz, Theresa Götz, Philipp Baumbach, Ralph Huonker, Otto W. Witte, Gerd Fabian Volk, Orlando Guntinas-Lichius, and Carsten M. Klingner. 2020. "Abnormal Emotional Processing and Emotional Experience in Patients with Peripheral Facial Nerve Paralysis: An MEG Study" Brain Sciences 10, no. 3: 147. https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci10030147

APA Style

Kheirkhah, M., Brodoehl, S., Leistritz, L., Götz, T., Baumbach, P., Huonker, R., Witte, O. W., Volk, G. F., Guntinas-Lichius, O., & Klingner, C. M. (2020). Abnormal Emotional Processing and Emotional Experience in Patients with Peripheral Facial Nerve Paralysis: An MEG Study. Brain Sciences, 10(3), 147. https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci10030147

Note that from the first issue of 2016, this journal uses article numbers instead of page numbers. See further details here.

Article Menu

Abnormal Emotional Processing and Emotional Experience in Patients with Peripheral Facial Nerve Paralysis: An MEG Study

Abstract

Share and Cite

Article Metrics

Article Access Statistics

Further Information

Guidelines

MDPI Initiatives

Follow MDPI