Case-control study reveals impaired affective theory of mind in restless legs syndrome independent of depressive symptoms, suggesting potential limbic-striatal network dysfunction.
Key Points
To assess whether individuals with restless legs syndrome demonstrate deficits in social cognition, specifically the ability to infer emotional mental states.
Conducted a case-control study comparing 22 individuals with restless legs syndrome to 22 healthy controls matched for age, sex, and education.
Administered standardized behavioral tasks evaluating multiple domains of social cognition, focusing on affective theory of mind.
Participants with restless legs syndrome demonstrated significantly lower scores on the affective theory of mind task compared to healthy controls.
The deficit in affective theory of mind remained statistically significant after adjusting for depressive symptoms, with no significant differences observed across other social-cognitive measures.