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The differential impact of severe childhood trauma on emotion recognition in males and females with first-episode psychosis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 August 2021

D. Penney ,
M. Pruessner ,
A. Malla ,
R. Joober  and
M. Lepage
D. Penney*
Affiliation:
Psychology / Psychiatry, Université du Québec à Montréal and the Douglas Mental Health University Institute, Montreal, Canada
M. Pruessner
Affiliation:
Clinical Psychology, University of Konstanz, Konstanz, Germany
A. Malla
Affiliation:
Psychiatry, Douglas Mental Health University Institute, Psychiatry, Canada
R. Joober
Affiliation:
Psychiatry, Douglas Mental Health University Institute, Psychiatry, Canada
M. Lepage
Affiliation:
Psychiatry, Douglas Mental Health University Institute, Psychiatry, Canada
*
*Corresponding author.

Abstract

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Introduction

Childhood trauma increases social functioning deficits, which in turn negatively impact social inclusion in those experiencing first-episode psychosis (FEP). Associations between aberrant higher-order social cognitive processes such as emotion recognition (ER) and trauma severity may be one pathway by which trauma negatively impacts social functioning.

Objectives

Given sex differences identified in the experience of childhood trauma, it is pertinent to evaluate how trauma severity may differentially impact ER in males and females.

Methods

Eighty-three FEP participants (52 males, 31 females) and 69 nonclinical controls (49 males, 20 females) completed the CogState Research Battery. FEP participants completed the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire. A sex × group (FEP, controls) ANOVA examined ER differences and was followed by two-way ANCOVAs investigating the effects of sex and childhood trauma severity (none, low, moderate, severe) on ER and global cognition in FEP.

Results

FEP participants had significantly lower ER scores than controls (p = .035). In FEP, a significant interaction emerged between sex and childhood trauma severity (F(3, 72) = 6.382, p = .001), selective to ER, while controlling for age at onset. Simple effects analyses revealed that females in the severe trauma category exhibited superior ER capacity relative to males.

Conclusions

The differential impact of trauma severity on ER in males and females with FEP may be theoretically interpreted as the distinct way that hypervigilance affects the sexes. Early intervention services should refine social cognitive interventions in male and female trauma survivors to facilitate social functioning improvements.

Disclosure

Funding: This study was supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (#68961) to M.L. and A.M. Salary awards include: The Fonds de recherche du Québec - Santé to M.L. and R.J., the James McGill Professorship to M.L., and the Canada Research Cha

Keywords

psychosissocial cognitionsex differenceschildhood trauma
Type
Abstract
Information
European Psychiatry , Volume 64 , Special Issue S1: Abstracts of the 29th European Congress of Psychiatry , April 2021 , pp. S166 - S167
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the European Psychiatric Association
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