Social Cognition, Executive Functions and Self-Report of Psychological Distress in Huntington ’s Disease

Conclusions We found significant associations between self-report of psychological distress and performances on social cognitive tests but not on tests of executive functions. According to our findings HD patients that feel less psychologically distressed themselves perform worse on tests of the ability to recognize emotions, ToM and sarcasm in others. This is an interesting finding that may be of importance for understanding the interpersonal problems often associated with HD. We speculate that one mechanism for this finding may be that shared representations of self and other as well as insight and apathy may be closely connected and may be mediated by overlapping neuroanatomical networks involving the prefrontal cortex and frontostriatal circuits. Therefore we speculate that a flattening of affect or apathy and impaired insight has led to low self-report of psychological distress in our cohort and that this was related to the weaker understanding of others (i.e. poor social cognitive skills including emotion recognition). Competing Interests Statement The authors have declared that no competing interests exist Data Availability Statement All relevant data are within the manuscript. Corresponding Author Ida Unmack Larsen (ida.unmack.larsen.01@regionh.dk)
Source: PLOS Currents Huntington Disease - Category: Neurology Authors: Source Type: research