Role of gender in emotion processing in Parkinson's disease

Objectives: Impaired facial emotion identification in Parkinson's disease (PD) has been reported for negative basic emotions, but results are quite heterogeneous1. In this context, gender is believed to be a major moderator variable, however, data are very limited2,3. Using a neuropsychological test battery and functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI), we aim to investigate gender effects on behavioral data and functional neural correlates of emotion processing in PD. Methods: A detailed clinical and neuropsychological test battery including the Ekman 60 faces task and event-related fMRI as well as anatomica…