This review aims to evaluate the empirical literature relating to the affect recognition and social cognition of patients who have lesions to areas of the frontal lobes of the brain. Following a thorough search, 39 papers were included in this systematic review. The majority of these papers reveal that most patients with lesions in the orbitofrontal and ventromedial areas of the frontal lobe have difficulties recognising emotion from faces or prosody, as well as impairments in some aspects of social cognition ("hot" social cognition: e.g. reduced cognitive and affective empathy, significant difficulties with processing of complex social emotions such as guilt). Impairments in theory of mind (or "cold" social cognition skills) are also widely reported in patients with damage to the ventromedial and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. This pattern of impairment is not only present in patients with focal damage (e.g. stroke, tumours, surgical lesions, some forms of TBI) but also in patients with diffuse damage to the frontal areas such as MS probably due to with lesions of fibre tracts in the white matter interconnecting cortical regions related to emotion processing and social cognition. The relationship between basic emotion recognition and social cognition is also discussed in the light of these findings, and recommendations are made for the neuro-rehabilitation of patients who have damage to the frontal lobes.