Alexithymia has been characterized as an impaired ability of emotion processing and regulation. The definition of alexithymia does not include a social component. However, there is some evidence that social cognition may be compromised in individuals with alexithymia. Hence, emotional impairments associated with alexithymia may extend to socially relevant information. Here, we recorded electrophysiological responses of individuals meeting the clinically relevant cutoff for alexithymia (ALEX; n = 24) and individuals without alexithymia (NonALEX; n = 23) while they viewed affective scenes that varied on the dimensions of sociality and emotional valence during a rapid serial visual presentation task. We found that ALEX exhibited lower accuracy and larger N2 than NonALEX in the perception of social negative scenes. Source reconstruction revealed that the group difference in N2 was localized at the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex. Irrespective of emotional valence, ALEX showed stronger alpha power than NonALEX in social but not non-social conditions. Our findings support the hypothesis of social processing being selectively affected by alexithymia, especially for stimuli with negative valence. Electrophysiological evidence suggests altered deployment of attentional resources in the perception of social-specific emotional information in alexithymia. This work sheds light on the neuropsychopathology of alexithymia and alexithymia-related disorders.

中文翻译：

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述情障碍中负面情绪感知的社会特异性损伤

述情障碍的特征是情绪处理和调节能力受损。述情障碍的定义不包括社会成分。然而，有一些证据表明，患有述情障碍的个体的社会认知可能会受​​到损害。因此，与述情障碍相关的情绪障碍可能会扩展到社会相关信息。在这里，我们记录了满足述情障碍临床相关临界值的个体（ALEX；n = 24）和没有述情障碍的个体（NonALEX；n = 23）的电生理反应，同时他们观看了在社交和情感效价维度上有所不同的情感场景。快速串行视觉呈现任务。我们发现 ALEX 在社交负面场景的感知方面表现出比 NonALEX 更低的准确度和更大的 N2。源重建显示 N2 的组差异位于背侧前扣带皮层。无论情绪效价如何，ALEX 在社交而非非社交条件下都表现出比 NonALEX 更强的阿尔法力量。我们的研究结果支持社交过程选择性地受到述情障碍影响的假设，特别是对于具有负效价的刺激。电生理学证据表明，在述情障碍中，注意力资源在感知社会特定情绪信息方面的部署发生了改变。这项工作揭示了述情障碍和述情障碍相关疾病的神经精神病理学。我们的研究结果支持社交过程选择性地受到述情障碍影响的假设，特别是对于具有负效价的刺激。电生理学证据表明，在述情障碍中，注意力资源在感知社会特定情绪信息方面的部署发生了改变。这项工作揭示了述情障碍和述情障碍相关疾病的神经精神病理学。我们的研究结果支持社交过程选择性地受到述情障碍影响的假设，特别是对于具有负效价的刺激。电生理学证据表明，在述情障碍中，注意力资源在感知社会特定情绪信息方面的部署发生了改变。这项工作揭示了述情障碍和述情障碍相关疾病的神经精神病理学。