Childhood facial emotion recognition and psychosis-like symptoms in a nonclinical population at 12 years of age: Results from the ALSPAC birth cohort

Abstract

Introduction. Nonclinical psychotic symptoms (for example, low intensity or low frequency psychotic symptoms such as ideas of reference or single word auditory hallucinations) are common in adolescents and may be associated with an increased risk of developing a psychotic disorder in adulthood. Those at high risk of developing a psychotic disorder appear to perform poorly on facial emotion recognition tasks but the relationship between facial emotion recognition and nonclinical “psychosis like symptoms” (PLIKS) in children is unclear. We aimed to examine the association between childhood facial emotion recognition and PLIKS in adolescents.

Methods. Longitudinal study using a large birth cohort. 6455 subjects completed a semistructured clinical assessment for psychotic symptoms (the PLIKSi) at the mean age of 12.9 (SD=0.23). Facial emotion recognition (using the DANVA) was previously assessed at the age of 8 in the cohort.

Results. There was no increase in odds of reporting any PLIKS either in relation to the total score on the measure of facial emotion recognition or for the individual emotion scores of fear, sadness, anger, and happiness. Similar results were also found when examining more intense and/or more frequently experienced psychotic symptoms.

Conclusions. Deficits in facial emotion recognition in 8-year-olds do not appear to predict later reporting of nonclinical psychotic symptoms in early adolescence. The results do not support the proposal that recognition of emotion is a trait phenomenon in those individuals at increased risk for psychosis. However, further research is warranted in older children/adolescents when more subtle emotion recognition deficits can be investigated.

Keywords:

• Cognition
• Cohort studies
• Populations at risk
• Psychotic disorders
• Social cognition

Acknowledgements

We are extremely grateful to all the families who took part in this study, the midwives for their help in recruiting them, and the whole ALSPAC team, which includes interviewers, computer and laboratory technicians, clerical workers, research scientists, volunteers, managers, receptionists, and nurses. AT designed the study along with GL and SS. KT and JH assisted with analysis of the data along with AT and provided statistic support. GH was principal investigator on the grant and provided supervision on all aspect of the study. All other authors were involved in the design and collection of the primary outcome measure and provided comments and feedback on the manuscript. All authors report no competing interests. All the authors had full access to all of the data in the study and take responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis. The UK Medical Research Council, the Wellcome Trust, and the University of Bristol provide core support for ALSPAC. The Wellcome Trust funded this particular research (Grant No. 072043). DG and GL are NIHR Senior Investigators. This publication is the work of the authors who will serve as guarantors for the contents of this paper.