Background. Persons with aphasia often present with low mood/depression, which can negatively affect their quality of life. The validity and reliability of existing depression measures for aphasia have been called into question. Eye tracking in nonstroke populations is reliable in identifying low mood/depression. Depressed persons are biased to negative emotions compared with nondepressed persons and have an absence of bias to positive emotions. However, nondepressed persons may be biased to positive emotions. Objective. To examine the feasibility of using eye tracking to measure mood in persons with aphasia. Methods. We recruited 22 persons with chronic aphasia and 12 healthy controls. Participants completed 2 self-report measures of mood. They also viewed faces that showed happy, sad, and neutral facial expressions during eye tracking. We analyzed 2 eye tracking indices: initial gaze orientation and gaze maintenance to happy, sad, and neutral faces. Results. For initial gaze orientation, participants with aphasia fixated faster on emotional faces compared with healthy controls but directed their gaze less often to happy faces compared with healthy controls. For gaze maintenance components, the duration of first fixation and total fixation duration were shorter on sad faces for participants with aphasia compared with healthy controls. Conclusion. Use of eye tracking with faces representing different mood states is feasible in persons with aphasia. Although there were some similarities, participants with aphasia had different gaze patterns to emotional faces compared with healthy controls. Further research is needed to establish whether this is a valid and reliable method of mood assessment.

中文翻译：

---

眼动追踪作为识别失语症情绪的工具：一项可行性研究

背景。失语症患者通常情绪低落/抑郁，这会对他们的生活质量产生负面影响。现有的失语症抑郁症测量方法的有效性和可靠性受到质疑。非中风人群的眼动追踪在识别情绪低落/抑郁方面是可靠的。与非抑郁症的人相比，抑郁症的人对消极情绪有偏见，并且没有对积极情绪的偏见。然而，非抑郁的人可能偏向于积极情绪。客观的。研究使用眼动追踪测量失语症患者情绪的可行性。方法。我们招募了 22 名慢性失语者和 12 名健康对照者。参与者完成了 2 项自我报告的情绪测量。他们还观察了在眼动追踪过程中表现出快乐、悲伤和中性面部表情的面孔。我们分析了 2 个眼动追踪指标：初始凝视方向和对快乐、悲伤和中性面孔的凝视维持。结果。对于初始凝视方向，与健康对照组相比，失语症参与者更快地注视情绪面孔，但与健康对照组相比，他们的目光较少地指向快乐面孔。对于凝视维持组件，与健康对照组相比，失语症参与者悲伤脸上的第一次注视持续时间和总注视持续时间更短。结论。在失语症患者中，对代表不同情绪状态的面部使用眼动追踪是可行的。尽管存在一些相似之处，但与健康对照组相比，失语症参与者对情绪化面孔的凝视模式有所不同。