Assessment of implicit language and theory of mind in multiple sclerosis.

Background: Increasing evidence suggests that social cognition, especially theory of mind (ToM), is impaired in individuals with multiple sclerosis (MS). ToM appears to be a determining factor for social functioning, but research has shown a connection between ToM and pragmatic language disorders among people with neurological or psychiatric disorders. Yet, pragmatic language remains a domain rarely referenced in MS.

Pain-related mood influences pain perception differently in fibromyalgia and multiple sclerosis.

In patients, the perception of pain intensity may be influenced by the subjective representation of their disease. Although both multiple sclerosis (MS) and fibromyalgia (FM) possibly include chronic pain, they seem to elicit different disease representations because of the difference in their respective etiology, the former presenting evidence of underlying lesions as opposed to the latter. Thus, we investigated whether patients with FM differed from patients with MS with respect to their perception of "own" pain as well as others' pain.