Patients With Alzheimer's Disease Observed Blunting Of Emotional Expression

Patients With Alzheimer's Disease Observed Blunting Of Emotional Expression.
Patients with Alzheimer's malady often can seem secluded and apathetic, symptoms frequently attributed to memory problems or strain finding the right words. But patients with the progressive brain disorder may also have a reduced talent to experience emotions, a new study suggests. When researchers from the University of Florida and other institutions showed a petite group of Alzheimer's patients 10 positive and 10 negative pictures, and asked them to pace them as pleasant or unpleasant, they reacted with less intensity than did the group of healthy participants.

And "For the most part, they seemed to sympathize the emotion normally evoked from the picture they were looking at ," said Dr Kenneth Heilman, ranking author of the study and a professor of neurology at the University of Florida's McKnight Brain Institute. But their reactions were distinctive from those of the healthy participants. "Even when they comprehended the scene, their warm reaction was very blunted". The study is published online in the Journal of Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences.

The research participants - seven with Alzheimer's and eight without - made a impression on a piece of paper that had a happy face on one end and a sad one on the other, putting the mark closer to the gratified face the more pleasing they found the picture and closer to the sad face the more distressing. Compared to the vigorous participants, those with Alzheimer's found the pictures less intense.

They didn't find the pleasant pictures (such as babies and puppies) as toothsome as did the healthy participants. They found the negative pictures (snakes, spiders) less negative. "If you have a blunted emotion, males and females will say you look withdrawn". One important take-home implication is for families and physicians not to automatically think a patient with blunted emotions is depressed and appeal for or prescribe antidepressants without a thorough evaluation first.