ABSTRACT
Intact perception and experience of emotion is vital for survival in the social environment. There has been increasing interest in the examination of the neurobiological basis of emotion perception in humans and non-human primates, and increasing evidence for abnormalities in emotion perception in patients with psychiatric disorders, including schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. This had led to the conceptualization of psychiatric disorders in terms of specific abnormalities of emotion perception. In this chapter, a brief outline will therefore be presented of findings from studies employing a variety of techniques which have helped to increase understanding of the nature of the neural systems underlying normal emotion perception. Findings from studies will then be described which have provided evidence for specific abnormalities in these neural systems, distinguishing patients with schizophrenia from those with bipolar disorder.
