Emotion Recognition

The recognition of emotional signals from all sensory modalities is a critical component of human social interactions. It is through the understanding of the affective states of others that we can guide our own behavioral responses. Notably, facial expression provides the greatest amount of emotional cues that are useful in recognizing emotions, such as joy, anger, and fear. The temporal lobe – and the amygdala in particular – plays a crucial role in processing the appropriate autonomic and behavioral responses to relevant emotional stimuli. Only in the past decade, however, the role played by the antero-medial temporal lobe region has been demonstrated in decoding the emotions, mental states, and beliefs of others. In the fi eld of epilepsy, this knowledge has several clinical, as well as speculative, implications. Indeed, temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) is the most common type of focal epilepsy. It is frequently characterized by lesions or gliosis/atrophy (hippocampal sclerosis) involving the medial temporal lobe region, and antero-medial temporal lobe resection is the standard treatment for drug-resistant medial TLE. Consequently, the investigation of emotional and social competence in TLE patients has been the focus of several studies. Such studies have extended the scope of neuropsychological evaluation in TLE beyond the traditional evaluation of memory, language, and executive functions.