Parkinson’s disease alters bodily sensations and emotions

05/03/2024

Editorial of the Health Diary

Emotions and physiology

Emotions have a huge impact on the way we act and regulate our hormones and many of the body’s vital functions. Emotions can also be associated with strong reactions and physical sensations, such as an increase in heart rate and blood pressure when we are scared or feel butterflies in our stomach on a first date.

Emotions are also reflected in the symptoms of many neurological and psychiatric disorders, with negative emotions in particular often increasing the symptoms of illness.

Kalle Niemi and colleagues at the University of Turku (Finland) wanted to know details of how this plays out specifically in the case of Parkinson’s disease.

In addition to being a neurological movement disorder characterized by motor symptoms such as slowness, rigidity and tremor, Parkinson’s disease is also associated with several non-motor symptoms such as depression, anxiety and autonomic nervous system dysfunction. It influences, for example, blood circulation and the functioning of the gastrointestinal tract.

Emotions in Parkinson’s patients

Volunteers were asked about their symptoms and their bodily sensations associated with different emotions (anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise and neutrality), drawing them on a map of the human body using a computer mouse.

The results showed that people with Parkinson’s disease present significant differences in all bodily sensations related to basic emotions when compared to healthy individuals – for comparison, see here a map of emotions in healthy people.

The differences were most pronounced in bodily sensations of anger. While in healthy people anger is concentrated in the chest region, in people with Parkinson’s disease the bodily sensation of anger migrates to the abdominal region as the disease progresses, which is consistent with the dysfunction of the autonomic nervous system associated with the disease.

Emotional abnormalities

Emotional abnormalities are common in psychiatric disorders, but this study is the first to show abnormalities in bodily sensations related to emotions in a neurological disorder. The results may open new perspectives on symptoms and possibly even symptom treatment in neurological disorders.

“The results of our study raise many interesting questions about the role of emotions in the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. Extending our research method to other diseases offers new possibilities for research in neurology,” said Professor Juho Joutsa.