A large number of studies have found that patients with bipolar disorders have a poor performance in tasks assessing social cognition.

The present study aimed to investigate whether euthymic bipolar patients (EBP) have a dysfunction in emotion processing when compared to controls. An additional objective was to determine whether there is association between emotion processing and psychosocial functioning.

A sample of 53 EBP and 53 healthy controls matched for age, gender, education level and premorbid intelligence were studied. All subjects were assessed using the MATRICS Consensus Cognitive Battery (MCCB) and two additional executive function measures: the Trail Making Test–Part B and the Stroop Test. Emotion processing was examined using the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT). Psychosocial functioning was assessed using the Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) scale and the Functional Assessment Short Test (FAST).

For the MSCEIT, EBP obtained lower total scores (P=0.001), experiential area scores (P=0.012), strategic area scores (P=0.000), perceiving emotions branch scores (P=0.008), understanding emotions branch scores (P=0.014) and managing emotions branch scores (P=0.000) than controls. There were no significant differences between groups for the using emotions branch (P=0.113). In addition, partial correlations controlling for sub-clinical psychopathology in EBP showed the existence of a significant correlation of MSCEIT total score and MSCEIT strategic area score with FAST total score.

EBP exhibit deficits in several areas of emotion processing. Performance in emotion processing tasks is associated with social functioning in these patients.