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Cognitive and affective theory of mind in patients with essential tremor

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Abstract

The theory of mind (ToM) is the ability to attribute mental states to oneself and others and to understand that others have beliefs, desires and intentions different from one’s own. The aim of the present study was to explore the neuropsychological correlates of cognitive and affective ToM in patients affected by essential tremor (ET). Thirty consecutive ET outpatients and 30 healthy age-, sex- and education-matched control subjects underwent tasks assessing short-term memory, verbal learning and executive functions, as well as tasks assessing “cognitive” and “affective” ToM; questionnaires evaluating behavioral disorders and quality of life were also administered. Although the two groups did not differ on demographic variables, ET patients scored worse on memory tasks, and showed more apathy and worse quality of life than controls. After covarying for mnestic, behavioral and quality of life scores, ET patients achieved significantly lower scores than controls on task assessing cognitive ToM, whereas no difference was found between the two groups on task assessing affective ToM. In ET, “Cognitive” ToM was significantly associated with frontal tasks, whereas “Affective” ToM was not correlated with cognitive, behavioral or quality of life scales. Our results indicate that cognitive aspects of ToM may be selectively impaired in ET. Possible underlying neural mechanisms of the deficits are discussed.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank Anna Maria Barbarulo for having provided ToM tasks.

Conflicts of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Second University of Naples, Caserta, Italy

    Gabriella Santangelo, Luigi Trojano, Domenico Errico, Ilaria Improta & Dario Grossi

  2. Istituto di Diagnosi e Cura “Hermitage Capodimonte”, Naples, Italy

    Gabriella Santangelo, Paolo Barone, Giuseppe Sorrentino & Carmine Vitale

  3. Neurodegenerative Diseases Center, University of Salerno, Salerno, Italy

    Paolo Barone

  4. University of Naples “Parthenope”, Naples, Italy

    Valeria Agosti, Giuseppe Sorrentino & Carmine Vitale

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  1. Gabriella Santangelo
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  2. Luigi Trojano
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  3. Paolo Barone
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  4. Domenico Errico
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  5. Ilaria Improta
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Correspondence to Paolo Barone.

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Santangelo, G., Trojano, L., Barone, P. et al. Cognitive and affective theory of mind in patients with essential tremor. J Neurol 260, 513–520 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00415-012-6668-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00415-012-6668-2

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