Congenital anosmia and emotion recognition: A case-control study

Cédric Lemogne, Julien Smadja, El-Hadi Zerdazi, Yaël Soudry, Marion Robin, Sylvie Berthoz, Frédéric Limosin, Silla M. Consoli, Pierre Bonfils
Neuropsychologia. 2015-06-01; 72: 52-58
DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2015.04.028

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1. Neuropsychologia. 2015 Jun;72:52-8. doi:
10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2015.04.028. Epub 2015 Apr 25.

Congenital anosmia and emotion recognition: A case-control study.

Lemogne C(1), Smadja J(2), Zerdazi el-H(3), Soudry Y(3), Robin M(4), Berthoz
S(4), Limosin F(5), Consoli SM(2), Bonfils P(6).

Author information:
(1)Université Paris Descartes, Sorbonne Paris Cité, Faculté de médecine, 15 rue
de l’Ecole de Médecine, 75015 Paris, France; AP-HP, Hôpitaux Universitaires
Paris Ouest, Service de Psychiatrie de l’adulte et du sujet âgé, 20 rue Leblanc,
75015 Paris, France; Inserm U894, Centre Psychiatrie et Neurosciences, 2 ter Rue
d’Alésia, 75014 Paris, France. Electronic address: .
(2)Université Paris Descartes, Sorbonne Paris Cité, Faculté de médecine, 15 rue
de l’Ecole de Médecine, 75015 Paris, France; AP-HP, Hôpitaux Universitaires
Paris Ouest, Service de Psychiatrie de l’adulte et du sujet âgé, 20 rue Leblanc,
75015 Paris, France.
(3)AP-HP, Hôpitaux Universitaires Paris Ouest, Service de Psychiatrie de
l’adulte et du sujet âgé, 20 rue Leblanc, 75015 Paris, France.
(4)Inserm U1178 & Institut Mutualiste Montsouris, Universités Paris-Sud & Paris
Descartes, 97 Bd Port Royal, 75014 Paris, France.
(5)Université Paris Descartes, Sorbonne Paris Cité, Faculté de médecine, 15 rue
de l’Ecole de Médecine, 75015 Paris, France; AP-HP, Hôpitaux Universitaires
Paris Ouest, Service de Psychiatrie de l’adulte et du sujet âgé, 20 rue Leblanc,
75015 Paris, France; Inserm U894, Centre Psychiatrie et Neurosciences, 2 ter Rue
d’Alésia, 75014 Paris, France.
(6)Université Paris Descartes, Sorbonne Paris Cité, Faculté de médecine, 15 rue
de l’Ecole de Médecine, 75015 Paris, France; AP-HP, Hôpitaux Universitaires
Paris Ouest, Service d’ORL et de chirurgie cervico-faciale, 20 rue Leblanc,
75015 Paris, France; CNRS UMR MD 8257, Cognition and Action Group, Centre
Universitaires des Saints-Pères, 45 rue des Saints Pères, 75006 Paris, France.

Patients with anosmia are not able to detect volatile chemicals signaling the
presence of infectious and non-infectious environmental hazards, which typically
elicit disgust and fear, respectively. Social animals may compensate a loss of
olfaction by taking advantage of signals of threat that are produced by their
conspecifics. Among humans and other primates, body postures and facial
expressions are powerful cues conveying emotional information, including fear
and disgust. The aim of the present study was to examine whether humans with
agenesis of the olfactory bulb, a rare disorder characterized by congenital
anosmia, would be more accurate in recognizing facial expressions of fear and
disgust. A total of 90 participants with no history of mental disorder or
traumatic brain injury were recruited, including 17 patients with congenital
anosmia (10 men, mean age ± standard deviation: 36.5 ± 14.8 years), 34 patients
with acquired anosmia (18 men, mean age ± standard deviation: 57.2 ± 11.8 years)
and 39 healthy subjects (22 men, mean age ± standard deviation: 36.7 ± 13.2
years). For each patient with congenital anosmia, the agenesis of the olfactory
bulb was ascertained through magnetic resonance imaging. Emotion recognition
abilities were examined with a dynamic paradigm in which a morphing technique
allowed displaying emotional facial expressions increasing in intensity over
time. Adjusting for age, education, depression and anxiety, patients with
congenital anosmia required similar levels of intensity to correctly recognize
fear and disgust than healthy subjects while they displayed decreased error
rates for both fear (mean difference [95% confidence interval] = -28.3% [-46.3%,
-10.2%], P = 0.003) and disgust (mean difference [95% confidence interval] =
-15.8% [-31.5%, -0.2%], P = 0.048). Furthermore, among patients with acquired
anosmia, there was a negative correlation between duration of anosmia and the
rate of errors for fearful (Spearman’s ρ = -0.531, P= 0.001) or disgust
(Spearman’s ρ = -0.719, P < 0.001) faces recognition. No significant difference
was observed for the other primary emotions. Overall, these results suggest that
patients with congenital anosmia and long-lasting acquired anosmia may
compensate their inability to detect environmental hazards through olfaction by
an increased ability to detect fear or disgust as facially expressed by others.

Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2015.04.028
PMID: 25921869 [Indexed for MEDLINE]

Auteurs Bordeaux Neurocampus