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Stroke, emotion and mood
Abstract
Stroke is the most common of neurological lesions. It may have a variety of impacts on cognitive and emotional functioning. In neuropsychological research a range of constructs pertaining to emotion have been utilized with scant attention to differences between these constructs. To bring some clarity to this situation distinctions were made between emotion, mood, and related constructs. Consideration was made of the components of emotion. The components were conceptualized here as being embedded in a continuum of components including neurochemistry, neurophysiology, autonomic function, facial somatics, emotional information processing and integrated neuropsychological. Based on the literature reviewed in these areas it was hypothesized that left CVA Ss would display greater depression and anxiety relative to right CVA Ss and controls. These findings were expected both on measures of immediate emotion and mood. It was further hypothesized that variables other than group status, especially cognitive and physical functioning measures would predict self-reported mood. The hypotheses of group differences were not substantiated. The failure to replicate group differences is explained by an assumed absence of prefrontal stroke patients in the sample and use of self-report instead of observer-rated mood measures. On regression analysis depressed mood was significantly related only to global cognitive functioning across groups. A significant within group correlation between depression and speech sound perception in Left CVA Ss may have resulted from measurement artifact. The role of artifacts in previous studies is considered. The relationship between anxiety and constructional skill across Right CVA and control groups is discussed in the context of the Yerkes-Dodson law. A relationship between depression and self-perception of loss in Right CVA groups and controls is discussed in the context of anosognosia and reactive mood. The entire set of results converge to suggest limits on the reliable and predictable relationship between neurological variables and post-stroke patterns of mood or emotion. The results suggest the need to broaden neuropsychological models of emotion to include psychological processes.
Subject Area
Psychotherapy|Physiological psychology
Recommended Citation
Smith, Glenn Eric, "Stroke, emotion and mood" (1988). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI8904512.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI8904512