Detecting atypical functioning of emotional processing in Colombian ex-combatants

Abstract

The reincorporation process of Colombian ex-combatants is hindered by their chronic exposure to violence, which affects their Emotional Processing (EP). Characterizing their EP will contribute to their reinsertion. The objective of this work is to define an EEG-based brain connectivity approach to identify differences in EP between Colombian ex-combatants and individuals who were not directly exposed to the armed conflict. The proposed approach involves defining the Regions of Interest (ROI) and selecting one of five commonly used brain connectivity metrics: Correlation, Cross-Correlation, Coherence, Imaginary part of Coherency, and Phase-Lag Index. Significant differences were found in the positive valence stimuli in the Beta frequency band. These results support the previously reported trend in the literature regarding the difficulties ex-combatants have to process emotional information with positive valence.