Altered empathic responding in major depressive disorder: Relation to symptom severity, illness burden, and psychosocial outcome

Psychiatry Research

Volumn 188, Issue 2, 2011, Pages 231-236

  Cusi, Andrée M ^a,b   MacQueen, Glenda M ^c   Spreng, R Nathan ^d   McKinnon, Margaret C ^a,b,e  

^a MCMASTER UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

^b Mood Disorders Program   (Canada)

^c UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY   (Canada)

^d HARVARD UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^e Kunin Lunenfeld Applied Research Unit and Department of Food and Nutrition Services and Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care   (Canada)

Author keywords

Depression; Empathy; Social functioning

Indexed keywords

AMFEBUTAMONE; BENZODIAZEPINE DERIVATIVE; MIRTAZAPINE; MONOAMINE OXIDASE INHIBITOR; NEUROLEPTIC AGENT; ROPINIROLE; SEROTONIN NORADRENALIN REUPTAKE INHIBITOR; SEROTONIN UPTAKE INHIBITOR; TRICYCLIC ANTIDEPRESSANT AGENT;

ADULT; ARTICLE; CLINICAL ARTICLE; COGNITION; CONTROLLED STUDY; DISEASE COURSE; DISEASE SEVERITY; ELECTROSTIMULATION THERAPY; EMPATHY; FEMALE; HUMAN; MAJOR DEPRESSION; MALE; OUTCOME ASSESSMENT; PRIORITY JOURNAL; PSYCHOSOCIAL CARE; QUESTIONNAIRE; RESTLESS LEGS SYNDROME; SOCIAL STATUS; SYMPTOM; THEORY OF MIND;

ADULT; COST OF ILLNESS; DEPRESSIVE DISORDER, MAJOR; EMPATHY; FEMALE; HUMANS; INTERPERSONAL RELATIONS; MALE; MIDDLE AGED; PERSONALITY DISORDERS; PSYCHIATRIC STATUS RATING SCALES; QUESTIONNAIRES; SELF REPORT; SEVERITY OF ILLNESS INDEX; SOCIAL ADJUSTMENT;

EID: 79958289651     PISSN: 01651781     EISSN: 01651781     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1016/j.psychres.2011.04.013     Document Type: Article

References (85)

1. American Psychiatric Association Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 1994, American Psychiatric Association, Washington, DC. 4th ed.
2. Andrews P.W., Thomson J.A. The bright side of being blue: depression as an adaptation for analyzing complex problems. Psychological Review 2009, 116:620-654.
3. Baldwin W. Information no one else knows: the value of self-report. The Science of Self-report: Implications for Research and Practice 2000, 3-7. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, NJ. A.A. Stone, J.S. Turkkan, C.A. Bachrach, J.B. Jobe, H.S. Kurtzman, V.S. Cain (Eds.).
4. Baron-Cohen S., Wheelwright S. The empathy quotient: an investigation of adults with Asperger syndrome or high functioning autism, and normal sex differences. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders 2004, 34:163-175.
5. Baron-Cohen S., Wheelwright S., Hill J., Raste Y., Plumb I. The "Reading the Mind in the Eyes" Test revised version: a study with normal adults, and adults with Asperger syndrome or high-functioning autism. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 2001, 42:241-251.
6. Basso M.R., Bornstein R.A. Relative memory deficits in recurrent versus first-episode major depression on a word-list learning task. Neuropsychology 1999, 13:557-563.
7. Beck A.T. Depression: Clinical, Experimental and Theoretical Aspects 1967, Harper & Row, New York.
8. Biver F., Goldman S., Delvenne V., Luxen A., De Maertelaer V., Hubain P., Mendlewicz J., Lotstra F. Frontal and parietal metabolic disturbances in unipolar depression. Biological Psychiatry 1994, 36:381-388.
9. Brooks J.O., Bonner J.C., Rosen A.C., Wang P.W., Hoblyn J.C., Hill S.J., Ketter T.A. Dorsolateral and dorsomedial prefrontal gray matter density changes associated with bipolar depression. Psychiatry Research 2009, 172:200-204.
10. Caetano S.C., Hatch J.P., Brambilla P., Sassi R.B., Nicoletti M., Mallinger A.G., Frank E., Kupfer D.J., Keshavan M.S., Soares J.C. Anatomical MRI study of hippocampus and amygdala in patients with current and remitted major depression. Psychiatry Research 2004, 132:141-147.
11. Christopher F.S., Owens L.A., Stecker H.L. Exploring the darkside of courtship: a test of a model of male premarital sexual aggressiveness. Journal of Marriage and the Family 1993, 55:469-479.
12. Coffey C.E., Wilkinson W.E., Weiner R.D., Parashos I.A., Djang W.T., Webb M.C., Figiel G.S., Spritzer C.E. Quantitative cerebral anatomy in depression. A controlled magnetic resonance imaging study. Archives of General Psychiatry 1993, 50:7-16.
13. Cusi A.M., MacQueen G.M., McKinnon M.C. Altered empathic responding in patients with bipolar disorder. Psychiatry Research 2010, 178:354-358.
14. David A.S., Cutting J.C. Affect, affective disorder and schizophrenia. A neuropsychological investigation of right hemisphere function. The British Journal of Psychiatry 1990, 156:491-495.
15. Davidson R.J., Irwin W., Anderle M.J., Kalin N.H. The neural substrates of affective processing in depressed patients treated with venlafaxine. The American Journal of Psychiatry 2003, 160:64-75.
16. Davis M.H. A multidimensional approach to individual differences in empathy. JSAS Catalog of Selected Documents in Psychology 1980, 10:85.
17. Davis M.H. Measuring individual differences in empathy: Evidence for a multi-dimensional approach. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 1983, 44:113-126.
18. Davis M.H. Empathy: A Social Psychological Approach 1994, Brown & Benchmark Publishers, Madison, WI.
19. Decety J., Moriguchi Y. The empathic brain and its dysfunction in psychiatric populations: implications for intervention across different clinical conditions. BioPsychoSocial Medicine 2007, 1:22.
20. Donges U.S., Kersting A., Dannlowski U., Lalee-Mentzel J., Arolt V., Suslow T. Reduced awareness of others' emotions in unipolar depressed patients. The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease 2005, 193:331-337.
21. Drevets W.C. Functional anatomical abnormalities in limbic and prefrontal cortical structures in major depression. Progress in Brain Research 2000, 126:413-431.
22. Drevets W.C., Raichle M.E. Neuroanatomical circuits in depression: implications for treatment mechanisms. Psychopharmacology Bulletin 1992, 28:261-274.
23. Drevets W.C., Savitz J., Trimble M. The subgenual anterior cingulate cortex in mood disorders. CNS Spectrums 2008, 13:663-681.
24. Dunn R.T., Kimbrell T.A., Ketter T.A., Frye M.A., Willis M.W., Luckenbaugh D.A., Post R.M. Principal components of the Beck Depression Inventory and regional cerebral metabolism in unipolar and bipolar depression. Biological Psychiatry 2002, 51:387-399.
25. Eslinger P.J. Neurological and neuropsychological bases of empathy. European Neurology 1998, 39:193-199.
26. Farrow T.F., Zheng Y., Wilkinson I.D., Spence S.A., Deakin J.F., Tarrier N., Griffiths P.D., Woodruff P.W. Investigating the functional anatomy of empathy and forgiveness. Neuroreport 2001, 12:2433-2438.
27. Gaebel W., Wolwer W. Facial expression and emotional face recognition in schizophrenia and depression. European Archives of Psychiatry and Clinical Neuroscience 1992, 242:46-52.
28. Gallagher H.L., Frith C.D. Functional imaging of 'theory of mind'. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 2003, 7:77-83.
29. Goeleven E., De Raedt R., Baert S., Koster E.H. Deficient inhibition of emotional information in depression. Journal of Affective Disorders 2006, 93:149-157.
30. Gotlib I.H., Kasch K.L., Traill S., Joormann J., Arnow B.A., Johnson S.L. Coherence and specificity of information-processing biases in depression and social phobia. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 2004, 113:386-398.
31. Gualtieri C.T., Johnson L.G., Benedict K.B. Neurocognition in depression: patients on and off medication versus healthy comparison subjects. Journal of Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences 2006, 18:217-225.
32. Hamilton M. A rating scale for depression. Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry 1960, 23:56-62.
33. Hastings R.S., Parsey R.V., Oquendo M.A., Arango V., Mann J.J. Volumetric analysis of the prefrontal cortex, amygdala, and hippocampus in major depression. Neuropsychopharmacology 2004, 29:952-959.
34. Hertel J., Schutz A., Lammers C.H. Emotional intelligence and mental disorder. Journal of Clinical Psychology 2009, 65:942-954.
35. Inoue Y., Tonooka Y., Yamada K., Kanba S. Deficiency of theory of mind in patients with remitted mood disorder. Journal of Affective Disorders 2004, 82:403-409.
36. Inoue Y., Yamada K., Kanba S. Deficit in theory of mind is a risk for relapse of major depression. Journal of Affective Disorders 2006, 95:125-127.
37. Joormann J., Gotlib I. Emotion regulation in depression: relation to cognitive inhibition. Cognition and Emotion 2010, 24:281-298.
38. Kan Y., Mimura M., Kamijima K., Kawamura M. Recognition of emotion from moving facial and prosodic stimuli in depressed patients. Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry 2004, 75:1667-1671.
39. Konarski J.Z., McIntyre R.S., Kennedy S.H., Rafi-Tari S., Soczynska J.K., Ketter T.A. Volumetric neuroimaging investigations in mood disorders: bipolar disorder versus major depressive disorder. Bipolar Disorders 2008, 10:1-37.
40. Lacerda A.L., Keshavan M.S., Hardan A.Y., Yorbik O., Brambilla P., Sassi R.B., Nicoletti M., Mallinger A.G., Frank E., Kupfer D.J., Soares J.C. Anatomic evaluation of the orbitofrontal cortex in major depressive disorder. Biological Psychiatry 2004, 55:353-358.
41. Lai T., Payne M.E., Byrum C.E., Steffens D.C., Krishnan K.R. Reduction of orbital frontal cortex volume in geriatric depression. Biological Psychiatry 2000, 48:971-975.
42. Landro N.I., Stiles T.C., Sletvold H. Neuropsychological function in nonpsychotic unipolar major depression. Neuropsychiatry, Neuropsychology, and Behavioral Neurology 2001, 14:233-240.
43. Lebowitz B.K., Shear P.K., Steed M.A., Strakowski S.M. Verbal fluency in mania: relationship to number of manic episodes. Neuropsychiatry, Neuropsychology, and Behavioral Neurology 2001, 14:177-182.
44. Lee L., Harkness K.L., Sabbagh M.A., Jacobson J.A. Mental state decoding abilities in clinical depression. Journal of Affective Disorders 2005, 86:247-258.
45. LeMoult J., Joormann J., Sherdell L., Wright Y., Gotlib I.H. Identification of emotional facial expressions following recovery from depression. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 2009, 118:828-833.
46. Leppänen J.M. Emotional information processing in mood disorders: a review of behavioral and neuroimaging findings. Current Opinion in Psychiatry 2006, 19:34-39.
47. Leppänen J.M., Milders M., Bell J.S., Terriere E., Hietanen J.K. Depression biases the recognition of emotionally neutral faces. Psychiatry Research 2004, 128:123-133.
48. MacQueen G.M., Galway T.M., Hay J., Young L.T., Joffe R.T. Recollection memory deficits in patients with major depressive disorder predicted by past depressions but not current mood state or treatment status. Psychological Medicine 2002, 32:251-258.
49. Mandal M.K., Bhattacharya B.B. Recognition of facial affect in depression. Perceptual and Motor Skills 1985, 61:13-14.
50. Mar R.A. The neural bases of social cognition and story comprehension. Annual Review of Psychology 2011, 62:103-134.
51. McKinnon M.C., Moscovitch M. Domain-general contributions to social reasoning: theory of mind and deontic reasoning re-explored. Cognition 2007, 102:179-218.
52. McKinnon M.C., Levine B., Moscovitch M. Domain-general contributions to social reasoning: the perspective from cognitive neuroscience. Integrating the Mind 2007, 153-177. Psychology Press, Hove, UK. M.J. Roberts (Ed.).
53. McKinnon M.C., Cusi A.M., MacQueen G.M. Impaired theory of mind performance in patients with recurrent bipolar disorder: moderating effect of cognitive load. Psychiatry Research 2010, 177:261-262.
54. Mikhailova E.S., Vladimirova T.V., Iznak A.F., Tsusulkovskaya E.J., Sushko N.V. Abnormal recognition of facial expression of emotions in depressed patients with major depression disorder and schizotypal personality disorder. Biological Psychiatry 1996, 40:697-705.
55. Mogg K., Millar N., Bradley B.P. Biases in eye movements to threatening facial expressions in generalized anxiety disorder and depressive disorder. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 2000, 109:695-704.
56. Montag C., Heinz A., Kunz D., Gallinat J. Self-reported empathic abilities in schizophrenia. Schizophrenia Research 2007, 92:85-89.
57. Nehra R., Chakrabarti S., Pradhan B., Khehra N. Comparison of cognitive functions between first- and multi-episode bipolar affective disorders. Journal of Affective Disorders 2006, 93:185-192.
58. Nofzinger E.A., Buysse D.J., Germain A., Price J.C., Meltzer C.C., Miewald J.M., Kupfer D.J. Alterations in regional cerebral glucose metabolism across waking and nonrapid eye movement sleep in depression. Archives of General Psychiatry 2005, 62:387-396.
59. O'Connor L.E., Berry J.W., Weiss J., Gilbert P. Guilt, fear, submission, and empathy in depression. Journal of Affective Disorders 2002, 71:19-27.
60. Pavuluri M.N., Schenkel L.S., Aryal S., Harral E.M., Hill S.K., Herbener E.S., Sweeney J.A. Neurocognitive function in unmedicated manic and medicated euthymic pediatric bipolar patients. The American Journal of Psychiatry 2006, 163:286-293.
61. Phillips M.L., Drevets W.C., Rauch S.L., Lane R. Neurobiology of emotion perception II: implications for major psychiatric disorder. Biological Psychiatry 2003, 54:515-528.
62. Porter R.J., Gallagher P., Thompson J.M., Young A.H. Neurocognitive impairment in drug-free patients with major depressive disorder. The British Journal of Psychiatry 2003, 182:214-220.
63. Premack D., Woodruff G. Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind?. The Behavioral and Brain Sciences 1978, 4:515-526.
64. Price J.L., Drevets W.C. Neurocircuitry of mood disorders. Neuropsychopharmacology 2010, 35:192-216.
65. Raes F., Hermans D., Williams J.M. Negative bias in the perception of others' facial emotional expressions in major depression: the role of depressive rumination. The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease 2006, 194:796-799.
66. Rankin K.P., Kramer J.H., Miller B.L. Patterns of cognitive and emotional empathy in frontotemporal lobar degeneration. Cognitive and Behavioral Neurology 2005, 18:28-36.
67. Rogers K., Dziobek I., Hassenstab J., Wolf O.T., Convit A. Who cares? Revisiting empathy in Asperger syndrome. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders 2007, 37:709-715.
68. Rubinow D.R., Post R.M. Impaired recognition of affect in facial expression in depressed patients. Biological Psychiatry 1992, 31:947-953.
69. Schenkel L.S., Marlow-O'Connor M., Moss J.A., Sweeney A., Pavuluri M.N. Theory of mind and social inference in children and adolescents with bipolar disorder. Psychological Medicine 2008, 38:791-800.
70. Shamay-Tsoory S.G., Shur S., Harari H., Levkovitz Y. Neurocognitive basis of impaired empathy in schizophrenia. Neuropsychology 2007, 21:431-438.
71. Shamay-Tsoory S., Harari H., Szepsenwol O., Levkovitz Y. Neuropsychological evidence of impaired cognitive empathy in euthymic bipolar disorder. Journal of Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences 2009, 21:59-67.
72. Sheline Y.I., Gado M.H., Price J.L. Amygdala core nuclei volumes are decreased in recurrent major depression. Neuroreport 1998, 9:2023-2028.
73. Sheline Y.I., Barch D.M., Donnelly J.M., Ollinger J.M., Snyder A.Z., Mintun M.A. Increased amygdala response to masked emotional faces in depressed subjects resolves with antidepressant treatment: an fMRI study. Biological Psychiatry 2001, 50:651-658.
74. Spreng R.N., McKinnon M.C., Mar R.A., Levine B. The Toronto Empathy Questionnaire: scale development and initial validation of a factor-analytic solution to multiple empathy measures. Journal of Personality Assessment 2009, 91:62-71.
75. Surguladze S.A., Young A.W., Senior C., Brebion G., Travis M.J., Phillips M.L. Recognition accuracy and response bias to happy and sad facial expressions in patients with major depression. Neuropsychology 2004, 18:212-218.
76. Suslow T., Junghanns K., Arolt V. Detection of facial expressions of emotions in depression. Perceptual and Motor Skills 2001, 92:857-868.
77. Uekermann J., Abdel-Hamid M., Lehmkamper C., Vollmoeller W., Daum I. Perception of affective prosody in major depression: a link to executive functions?. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society 2008, 14:552-561.
78. Uekermann J., Channon S., Lehmkämper C., Abdel-Hamid M., Vollmoeller W., Daum I. Executive function, mentalizing and humor in major depression. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society 2008, 14:55-62.
79. van Gorp W.G., Altshuler L., Theberge D.C., Wilkins J., Dixon W. Cognitive impairment in euthymic bipolar patients with and without prior alcohol dependence. A preliminary study. Archives of General Psychiatry 1998, 55:41-46.
80. Vogeley K., Bussfeld P., Newen A., Herrmann S., Happe F., Falkai P., Maier W., Shah N.J., Fink G.R., Zilles K. Mind reading: neural mechanisms of theory of mind and self-perspective. NeuroImage 2001, 14:170-181.
81. Wang Y.G., Wang Y.Q., Chen S.L., Zhu C.Y., Wang K. Theory of mind disability in major depression with or without psychotic symptoms: a componential view. Psychiatry Research 2008, 161:153-161.
82. Weissman M.M., Bothwell S. Assessment of social adjustment by patient self-report. Archives of General Psychiatry 1976, 32:1111-1115.
83. Weissman M.M., Staff M. Social Adjustment Scale - Self-Report (SAS) 1999, Multi-Health Systems Inc., Tonawanda, NY.
84. Wright S.L., Langenecker S.A., Deldin P.J., Rapport L.J., Nielson K.A., Kade A.M., Own L.S., Akil H., Young E.A., Zubieta J.K. Gender-specific disruptions in emotion processing in younger adults with depression. Depression and Anxiety 2009, 26:182-189.
85. Zahn R., de Oliveira-Souza R., Bramati I., Garrido G., Moll J. Subgenual cingulate activity reflects individual differences in empathic concern. Neuroscience Letters 2009, 457:107-110.