Table 1.
Sociodemographic and clinical data.
Figure 1.
In the micro-expressions sequence displayed here, emotional expressions were masked by neutral expressions. In the macro-expressions sequence, facial expressions were presented for 533 ms. Both sequences consisted of alternating blocks of face stimuli and no-face stimuli. In each block, facial stimuli were presented in a randomized order.
Table 2.
Masked expressions sequence: task effects on bilateral insula and amygdala activation.
Table 3.
Unmasked expressions sequence: task effects on bilateral insula and amygdala activation.
Figure 2.
Two-sample t-test comparing insula activation in patients and controls.
In comparison with controls, schizophrenia patients show reduced bilateral insula activation in response to masked facial expressions of disgust (Axial view, z = 1, color bar Z-score). Visualization was performed using a standard anatomical template from the MRIcron toolbox (www.mricro.com/mricron).
Figure 3.
Boxplot illustrating the distribution of left insula activation values in patients and controls.
Schizophrenia patients show overall reduced insula activation levels in comparison with the control group. The distribution is similar for the right insula.
Figure 4.
Correlation between insula activation and social loneliness in patients.
In schizophrenia patients, right insula responsiveness to masked expressions of disgust is positively correlated with social loneliness (Axial view, z = 0, color bar correlation coefficient r). The scatter plot displays the correlation between the social loneliness scale scores and the mean cluster activation values (r = 0.45). Visualization was performed using a standard anatomical template from the MRIcron toolbox (www.mricro.com/mricron).
Figure 5.
Correlation between insula activation and agreeableness in patients.
In schizophrenia patients, bilateral insula responsiveness to masked expressions of disgust is negatively correlated with agreeableness (Axial view, z = 0, color bar correlation coefficient r). The scatter plot displays the correlation between the agreeableness scale scores and the mean cluster activation values for the left insula (r = −0.55). Visualization was performed using a standard anatomical template from the MRIcron toolbox (www.mricro.com/mricron).