Social Adjustment,Academic Adjustment,and the Ability to Identify Emotion in Facial Expressions of 7-Year-Old Children

The authors aimed to examine the possible association between (a) accurately reading emotion in facial expressions and (b) social and academic competence among elementary school-aged children. Participants were 840 7-year-old children who completed a test of the ability to read emotion in facial expressions. Teachers rated children's social and academic behavior using behavioral rating scales. The authors found that children who had more difficulty identifying emotion in faces also were more likely to have more problems overall and, more specifically, with peer relationships among boys and with learning difficulties among girls. Findings suggest that nonverbal receptive skill plays a significant role in children's social and academic adjustment.     

African American Children's Ability to Identify Emotion in Facial Expressions and Tones of Voice of European Americans

This study examined whether African American children's ability to identify emotion in the facial expressions and tones of voice of European American stimuli was comparable to their European American peers and related to personality, social competence, and achievement. The Diagnostic Analysis of Nonverbal Accuracy (DANVA; Now-icki & Duke, 1994) was administered to 84 African American children. It was found that they performed less accurately on adult and child tones of voice and adult facial expressions. Further, girls' ability to read emotion in tones of voice was related to better social competence and achievement, whereas boys' ability to identify emotion in adult tones of voice was related to teacher-rated social competence. Results suggest that more research is needed with ethnic groups to clarify the impact of nonverbal processing skills on social and achievement outcomes.     

A Cross‐Cultural Comparison of U.S. and Japanese Trainees’ Emotion‐Recognition Ability

This study investigated the ability of non‐Hispanic White U.S. counseling psychology trainees and Japanese clinical psychology trainees to recognize facially expressed emotions. Researchers proposed that an in‐group advantage for emotion recognition would occur, women would have higher emotion‐recognition accuracy than men, and participants would vary in their emotion‐intensity ratings. Sixty White U.S. students and 60 Japanese students viewed photographs of non‐Hispanic White U.S. and Japanese individuals expressing emotions and completed a survey assessing emotion‐recognition ability and emotion‐intensity ratings. Two four‐way mixed‐factor analyses of variance were performed, examining effects of participant nationality/race, participant gender, poser nationality/race, and poser gender on emotion‐recognition accuracy scores and intensity ratings. Results did not support the in‐group advantage hypothesis, rather, U.S. participants had higher accuracy rates than Japanese trainees overall. No gender differences in accuracy were found. However, respondents varied in their intensity ratings across gender and nationality. Implications for training applied psychology students and for future research are presented.     

小学儿童混合情绪理解的发展研究*

旨在探究小学阶段儿童的混合情绪理解发展状况。以能够引发儿童混合情绪的经典故事情景为材料,对小学1-6年级242名儿童采用半结构式访谈法和测验法进行实验,结果表明:小学儿童混合情绪理解水平存在显著的年龄效应,呈现出随年龄增大混合情绪理解水平逐渐提高的发展趋势。对他人和对自身混合情绪理解差异显著,对他人混合情绪的理解是对自身混合理解的基础,同性质和不同性质(冲突)混合情绪的理解能力存在显著差异。不同性质(冲突)混合情绪的理解能力发展较晚。因此,混合情绪理解能力在小学阶段快速发展,呈现出年龄、理解的对象、情绪的性质三个方面的显著差异。     

Visual-Field Bias in the Judgment of Facial Expression of Emotion

The left and right hemispheres of the brain are differentially related to the processing of emotions. Although there is little doubt that the right hemisphere is relatively superior for processing negative emotions, controversy exists over the hemispheric role in the processing of positive emotions. Eighty right-handed normal male participants were examined for visual-field (left-right) differences in the perception of facial expressions of emotion. Facial composite (RR, LL) and hemifacial (R, L) sets depicting emotion expressions of happiness and sadness were prepared. Pairs of such photographs were presented bilaterally for 150 ms, and participants were asked to select the photographs that looked more expressive. A left visual-field superiority (a right-hemisphere function) was found for sad facial emotion. A hemispheric advantage in the perception of happy expression was not found.     

High Hostility Among Smokers Predicts Slower Recognition of Positive Facial Emotion

High levels of trait hostility are associated with wide-ranging interpersonal deficits and heightened physiological response to social stressors. These deficits may be attributable in part to individual differences in the perception of social cues. The present study evaluated the ability to recognize facial emotion among 48 high hostile (HH) and 48 low hostile (LH) smokers and whether experimentally-manipulated acute nicotine deprivation moderated relations between hostility and facial emotion recognition. A computer program presented series of pictures of faces that morphed from a neutral emotion into increasing intensities of happiness, sadness, fear, or anger, and participants were asked to identify the emotion displayed as quickly as possible. Results indicated that HH smokers, relative to LH smokers, required a significantly greater intensity of emotion expression to recognize happiness. No differences were found for other emotions across HH and LH individuals, nor did nicotine deprivation moderate relations between hostility and emotion recognition. This is the first study to show that HH individuals are slower to recognize happy facial expressions and that this occurs regardless of recent tobacco abstinence. Difficulty recognizing happiness in others may impact the degree to which HH individuals are able to identify social approach signals and to receive social reinforcement.     

自豪的结构、测量、表达与识别

自豪是个体把一个成功事件或积极事件归因于自身能力或努力的结果时所产生的一种积极的主观情绪体验。自豪作为一种自我意识情绪,具有双维结构,可以分为真实的自豪和自大的自豪。自豪的非言语表达和识别具有跨文化的普遍性。对自豪的测量,目前大多采用自我评定和非言语表达编码两种方式。     

Biased Facial Expression Interpretation in Shy Children

The relationship between shyness and the interpretations of the facial expressions of others was examined in a sample of 123 children aged 12 to 14 years. Participants viewed faces displaying happiness, fear, anger, disgust, sadness, surprise, as well as a neutral expression, presented on a computer screen. The children identified each expression by pressing a button on an external keyboard. For each expression, children also rated (a) the degree to which they felt the child displaying the expression would like them, (b) the probability that someone at school would look at them with that expression, and (c) their own emotional reaction to interacting with a child displaying the expression. Participants also completed the Children's Shyness Questionnaire and the Children's Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire. We hypothesized that shyness in children would be related to negatively biased interpretations of facial expressions. Although the accuracy with which the children could identify the facial expressions was not related to their degree of shyness, negative biases were found in their interpretations of the meanings of the expressions. Furthermore, rejection sensitivity significantly mediated many of these biased interpretations. These findings may have implications for interventions for children experiencing shyness and social anxiety, especially social‐skills training approaches. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Recognition of Emotion in Facial Expressions and Vocal Tones in Children With Psychopathic Tendencies

The authors investigated the ability of children with emotional and behavioral difficulties, divided according to their Psychopathy Screening Device scores (P. J. Frick & R. D. Hare, in press), to recognize emotional facial expressions and vocal tones. The Psychopathy Screening Device indexes a behavioral syndrome with two dimensions: affective disturbance and impulsive and conduct problems. Nine children with psychopathic tendencies and 9 comparison children were presented with 2 facial expression and 2 vocal tone subtests from the Diagnostic Analysis of Nonverbal Accuracy (S. Nowicki & M. P. Duke, 1994). These subtests measure the ability to name sad, fearful, happy, and angry facial expressions and vocal affects. The children with psychopathic tendencies showed selective impairments in the recognition of both sad and fearful facial expressions and sad vocal tone. In contrast, the two groups did not differ in their recognition of happy or angry facial expressions or fearful, happy, and angry vocal tones. The results are interpreted with reference to the suggestion that the development of psychopathic tendencies may reflect early amygdala dysfunction (R. J. R. Blair, J. S. Morris, C. D. Frith, D. I. Perrett, & R. Dolan, 1999).     

Emotion Comprehension: The Impact of Nonverbal Intelligence

A substantial body of research has established that emotion understanding develops throughout early childhood and has identified three hierarchical developmental phases: external, mental, and reflexive. The authors analyzed nonverbal intelligence and its effect on children's improvement of emotion understanding and hypothesized that cognitive level is a consistent predictor of emotion comprehension. In all, 366 children (182 girls, 184 boys) between the ages of 3 and 10 years were tested using the Test of Emotion Comprehension and the Coloured Progressive Matrices. The data obtained by using the path analysis model revealed that nonverbal intelligence was statistically associated with the ability to recognize emotions in the 3 developmental phases. The use of this model showed the significant effect that cognitive aspect plays on the reflexive phase. The authors aim to contribute to the debate about the influence of cognitive factors on emotion understanding.     

听力障碍幼儿情绪理解的干预研究

根据听障幼儿情绪理解发展特点,编制了情绪理解干预课程,并进行为期12周的干预训练。研究结果表明：干预训练显著提高了听障幼儿的外部情绪理解水平和内部情绪状态理解水平;不同性别听障幼儿在情绪理解干预课程中的表现有所不同,女生在信念理解、道德情绪理解和情绪原因理解中的干预效果均显著优于男生。本研究所编制的干预课程对于促进听障幼儿情绪理解发展的效果良好。     

The Treatment of Test Anxiety in Elementary School-Age Children

Test anxiety has a dramatic impact upon a surprisingly large segment of the school population. Although test anxiety has been extensively studied for decades, little research has focused on intervention programs for younger school children. This paper discussed the conceptual framework of test anxiety and the resulting intervention philosophy from these different theoretical formulations. Assessment procedures for children are reviewed. Different kinds of intervention programs are discussed, compared and evaluated. These include systematic desensitization, cognitive restructuring, and educational approaches such as study skills training and modeling. Recommendations are made to enhance the existing research. Suggestions for future research are presented.     

小学生对情绪社会调节作用的理解

考察了小学二、四、六年级学生对情绪社会调节作用理解的特点.结果表明:小学生认为愤怒、悲伤和恐惧情绪标志着表达者不同的人际地位,会诱发接受者不同的情绪和后继行为:愤怒情绪标志着表达者的支配地位,会诱发出接受者的恐惧情绪和道歉认错行为;悲伤和恐惧标志着表达者的非支配地位,会诱发出接受者的悲伤情绪和目标恢复行为,恐惧情绪有时还会诱发接受者的高兴情绪.在对愤怒、悲伤和恐惧情绪反映表达者的社会目标的理解上,没有差异,都反映了表达者期待接受者采取目标恢复的社会行为.高年级学生在区分不同情绪表达的支配性以及诱发接受者的情绪上,存在着差别;低年级学生对接受者的后继行为的理解存在着差异.     

表情强度对自闭症儿童面部表情识别影响的实验研究

为探寻自闭症儿童在识别低强度（10%,30%）、中强度（40%,60%）和高强度（70%,90%）的愤怒和开心面部表情时,识别情绪类型的既有能力和差异。采用表情标签范式,用E-prime软件在电脑上呈现不同强度的3D合成面部表情刺激,分别对10名自闭症儿童、10名正常发育儿童和10名智障儿童进行了实验研究。结果发现,自闭症儿童在低强度表情时具有面部表情识别障碍,其对不同强度面部表情识别正确率显著低于智障儿童和正常发育儿童;自闭症儿童面部表情识别正确率与面部表情强度呈正相关,面部表情强度越大,自闭症儿童面部表情识别的正确率越高;自闭症儿童对低强度面部表情识别时,对开心表情的识别正确率高于愤怒表情,但是,在中强度和高强度面部表情识别时,存在显著的愤怒优势效应。     

背景颜色对中性面孔情绪识别的影响:隐喻的视角

为考察背景颜色对中性面孔情绪识别的影响及时间特征,采用混合实验设计,背景颜色为组内变量,呈现时间为组间变量,要求被试报告对中性面孔的愉快体验及其程度。结果发现:(1)背景颜色主效应显著,相较于冷色调,暖色调背景下,中性面孔愉快感知百分比更高,愉快程度评定分数也更高。(2)颜色和时间的交互作用不存在显著差异。这表明,背景颜色影响个体对中性面孔图片的情绪识别,且该效应在不同时间进程下均存在。     

自动情绪调节对负性情绪面孔注意偏向的影响

本研究通过成语匹配任务启动情绪调节目标,在情绪flanker任务中考察了自动情绪调节启动对注意偏向的影响。结果表明,中性启动条件下,被试表现出对负性情绪面孔的注意偏向,而情绪调节启动条件下,被试对正性、负性情绪面孔的注意分配不存在显著差异。这一结果说明自动情绪调节可以有效地减弱被试的负性情绪面孔注意偏向。     

Recognition of Facial Expressions of Emotion by Children with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders

Interpreting and responding appropriately to facial expressions of emotion are important aspects of social skills. Some children, adolescents, and adults with various psychological and psychiatric disorders recognize facial expressions less proficiently than their peers in the general population. We wished to determine if such deficits existed in a group of 133 children and adolescents with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD). The subjects were receiving in-patient psychiatric services for at least one of substance-related disorders, adjustment disorders, anxiety disorders, mood disorders or disruptive behavior disorders. After being read stories describing various emotional reactions, all subjects were tested for their ability to recognize the 6 basic facial expressions of emotion depicted in Ekman and Friesen's (1976) normed photographs. Overall, they performed well on this task at levels comparable to those occurring in the general population. Accuracy increased with age, irrespective of gender, ethnicity, or clinical diagnosis. After adjusting for age effects, the subjects diagnosed with either adjustment disorders, mood disorders, or disruptive behavior disorders were significantly more accurate at identifying anger than those without those diagnoses. In addition, subjects with mood disorders identified sadness significantly more accurately than those without this diagnosis, although the effect was greatest with younger children.     

Children Expressing Mixed Emotion in a Nonsocial Context

Abstract

Efforts to demonstrate children’s ability to report experiencing mixed emotions have typically used an allocentric approach, asking children to report on emotions of other individuals in response to stories or movie clips demonstrating social themes. In contrast, literature examining children’s personal experiencing and understanding of their own mixed emotions, typified as an egocentric approach, in nonsocial situations remains underdeveloped. The current study examined the development of children’s reported understanding and experience of mixed emotions egocentrically. By examining a nonsocial context, this investigation extends existing gender- and age-related research on expressing egocentric mixed emotion. Using a computerized game with a disappointing wins paradigm, egocentric mixed emotional experience was elicited in 142 children (80 boys, 62 girls) aged 6 to 12?years. Results revealed that age, but not gender, was a statistically significant predictor of expressing egocentric mixed emotion experience and understanding. When studying mixed emotion development in a nonsocial context, gender did not contribute to differences in child reports. A significant positive relationship between egocentric mixed emotion experiencing and understanding also emerged. These findings contribute to our understanding of children’s emotion development and offer future directions for examining the broad domain of nonsocial contexts in youth expression of mixed emotions.     

Facial Expressions and the Ability to Recognize Emotions from the Eyes or Mouth: A Comparison Between Children and Adults

The authors sought to contribute to the literature on the ability to recognize anger, happiness, fear, surprise, sadness, disgust, and neutral emotions from facial information. They aimed to investigate if—regardless of age—this pattern changes. More specifically, the present study aimed to compare the difference between the performance of adults and 6- to 7-year-old children in detecting emotions from the whole face and a specific face region, namely the eyes and mouth. The findings seem to indicate that, for both groups, recognizing disgust, happiness, and surprise is facilitated when pictures represent the whole face. However, with regard to a specific region, a prevalence for children was not found between the eyes and mouth. Meanwhile, for adults, would seem to detect a greater role of the eye region. Finally, regarding the differences in the performance of emotions recognition, adults are better only in a few cases, whereas children are better in recognizing anger from the mouth.     

Attention to Emotion and Non-Western Faces: Revisiting the Facial Feedback Hypothesis

In a modified replication of Strack, Martin, and Stepper's demonstration of the Facial Feedback Hypothesis (1988), we investigated the effect of attention to emotion on the facial feedback process in a non-western cultural setting. Participants, recruited from two universities in Ghana, West Africa, gave self-reports of their perceived levels of attention to emotion, and then completed cartoon-rating tasks while randomly assigned to smiling, frowning, or neutral conditions. While participants with low Attention to Emotion scores displayed the usual facial feedback effect (rating cartoons as funnier when in the smiling compared to the frowning condition), the effect was not present in individuals with high Attention to Emotion. The findings indicate that (1) the facial feedback process can occur in contexts beyond those in which the phenomenon has previously been studied, and (2) aspects of emotion regulation, such as Attention to Emotion can interfere with the facial feedback process.