Children's interpretation of facial expressions: The long path from valence-based to specific discrete categories

Emotion Review

Volumn 5, Issue 1, 2013, Pages 72-77

  Widen, Sherri C ^a  

^a BOSTON COLLEGE   (United States)

Author keywords

children; differentiation; emotion categories; facial expressions

Indexed keywords

EID: 84872172048     PISSN: 17540739     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/1754073912451492     Document Type: Review

References (56)

1. Aviezer H., Hassin R. R., Ryan J., Grady C., Susskind J., Anderson A., Bentin S.. Angry, disgusted, or afraid? Studies on the malleability of emotion perception. Psychological Science. 2008 ; 19: 724-732
2. Balconi M., Carrera A.. Emotional representation in facial expression and script: A comparison between normal and autistic children. Research in Developmental Disabilities. 2007 ; 28: 409-422
3. Blair C.. School readiness: Integrating cognition and emotion in a neurobiological conceptualization of children's functioning at school entry. American Psychologist. 2002 ; 57: 111-127
4. Bretherton I., McNew S., Beeghly-Smith M. Infant social cognition. Lamb M. E. Sherrod L. R., ed. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum ; 1981: 333-373.
5. Bullock M., Russell J. A.. Preschool children's interpretation of facial expressions of emotion. International Journal of Behavioral Development. 1984 ; 7: 193-214
6. Camras L. A., Allison K.. Children's understanding of emotional facial expressions and verbal labels. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior. 1985 ; 9: 84-94
7. Caron R. F., Caron A. J., Myers R. S.. Do infants see emotional expressions in static faces?. Child Development. 1985 ; 56: 1552-1560
8. de Mendoza A. H., Fernández-Dols J. M., Parrott W. G., Carrera P.. Emotion terms, category structure, and the problem of translation: The case of. shame vergüenza. Cognition & Emotion. 2010 ; 24: 661-680
9. Denham S. A. Emotional development in young children. New York, NY: Guilford Press ; 1998:
10. Denham S. A., Couchoud E. A.. Young preschoolers' understanding of emotions. Child Study Journal. 1990 ; 20: 171-192
11. Ekman P., Friesen W. V. Pictures of facial affect. Palo Alto, CA: Consulting Psychologists Press ; 1976:
12. Fehr B., Russell J. A.. Concept of emotion viewed from a prototype perspective. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. 1984 ; 113: 464-486
13. Gao X., Maurer D.. Influence of intensity on children's sensitivity to happy, sad, and fearful facial expressions. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology. 2009 ; 102: 503-521
14. Garner P. W., Waajid B.. The associations of emotion knowledge and teacher-child relationships to preschool children's school-related developmental competence. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology. 2008 ; 29: 89-100
15. Gelman S. A. The essential child: Origins of essentialism in everyday thought. New York, NY: Oxford University Press ; 2003:
16. Language in mind. Gentner D. Goldin-Meadow S., ed. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press ; 2003:
17. Harris P. L. Children and emotion: The development of psychological understanding. Oxford, UK: Basil Blackwell ; 1989:
18. Hassin R. R., Aviezer H., Bentin S.. Embodied faces: Emotional expressions in context. Emotion Review. 2013 ; 5: 60-65
19. Haviland J. M., Lelwica M.. The induced affect response: 10-week-old infants' responses to three emotion expressions. Developmental Psychology. 1987 ; 23: 97-104
20. Izard C. E. The face of emotion. New York, NY: Appleton Century Crofts ; 1971:
21. Izard C. E.. Innate and universal facial expressions: Evidence from developmental and cross-cultural research. Psychological Bulletin. 1994 ; 2: 288-299
22. KayyalM. H.WidenS. C.RussellJ. A. (2012). Palestinian and American children's understanding of facial expressions of emotion. Manuscript in preparation.
23. Klinnert M. D., Emde R. N., Butterfield P., Campos J. J.. Social referencing: The infant's use of emotional signals from a friendly adult with mother present. Developmental Psychology. 1986 ; 22: 427-432
24. Lindquist K. A., Barrett L. F., Bliss-Moreau E., Russell J. A.. Language and the perception of emotion. Emotion. 2006 ; 6: 125-138
25. Lindquist K. A., Gendron M.. What's in a word? Language constructs emotion perception. Emotion Review. 2013 ; 5: 66-71
26. Massarani R., Gosselin P., Montembeault P., Gagnon M., Suurland A... Poster presented at SRCD Conference ; 2011, March Montreal, Canada ; 2011, March..
27. Mondloch C. J.. Sad or fearful? The influence of body posture on adults' and children's perception of facial displays of emotion. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology. 2012 ; 111: 180-196
28. Reichenbach L., Masters J. C.. Children's use of expressive and contextual cues in judgements of emotion. Child Development. 1983 ; 54: 993-1004
29. Ridgeway D., Waters E., Kuczaj S. A.. Acquisition of emotion-descriptive language: Receptive and productive vocabulary norms for ages 18 months to 6 years. Developmental Psychology. 1985 ; 21: 901-908
30. RobersonD.KiutaniM.DögeP.WhitakerL.MajidA. (2012). Who's happy now? Developmental changes in emotion classification from facial expressions. Manuscript submitted for publication.
31. Russell J. A., Carroll J. M.. Do facial expressions signal specific emotions? Judging emotion from the face in context. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 1996 ; 70: 205-218
32. Russell J. A., Sato K.. Comparing emotion words between languages. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology. 1995 ; 26: 384-91
33. Russell J. A., Widen S. C.. A label superiority effect in children's categorization of facial expressions. Social Development. 2002a ; 11: 30-52
34. Russell J. A., Widen S. C.. Words versus faces in evoking children's knowledge of the causes of emotions. International Journal of Behavioral Development. 2002b ; 26: 97-103
35. Shariff A. F., Tracy J. L.. What are emotion expressions for?. Current Directions in Psychological Science. 2011 ; 20: 395-399
36. Soken N. H., Pick A. D.. Infants' perception of dynamic affective expressions: Do infants distinguish specific expressions?. Child Development. 1999 ; 70: 1275-1282
37. Southam-Gerow M. A., Kendall P. C.. Emotion regulation and understanding: Implications for child psychopathology and therapy. Clinical Psychology Review. 2002 ; 22: 189-222
38. Székely E., Tiemeir H., Arends L., Jaddoe V., Hofman A., Verhulst F., Herba C.. Recognition of facial expressions of emotions by 3-year-olds. Emotion. 2011 ; 11 (2). 425-435
39. Tottenham N., Tanaka J. W., Leon A. C., McCarry T., Nurse M., Hare T. A., Nelson C.. The NimStim set of facial expressions: Judgments from untrained research participants. Psychiatry Research. 2008 ; 15: 242-249
40. van der Schalk J., Hawk S. T., Fischer A. H., Doosje B.. Moving faces, looking places: Validation of the Amsterdam Dynamic Facial Expression Set (ADFES). Emotion. 2011 ; 11: 907-920
41. Vicari S., Reilly J. S., Pasqualetti P., Vizzotto A., Caltagirone C.. Recognition of facial expression of emotions in school-age children: The intersection of perceptual and semantic categories. Acta Paediatrica. 2000 ; 89: 836-845
42. Wagner H. L.. On measuring performance in category judgment studies of nonverbal behavior. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior. 1993 ; 17: 3-28
43. Walker-Andrews A. The development of social cognition and communication. Homer B. D. Tamis-LeMonda C. S., ed. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum ; 2005: 93-116.
44. Widen S. C., Russell J. A.. Gender and preschoolers' perception of emotion. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly. 2002 ; 48: 248-262
45. Widen S. C., Russell J. A.. A closer look at preschoolers' freely produced labels for facial expressions. Developmental Psychology. 2003 ; 39: 114-128
46. Widen S. C., Russell J. A.. The relative power of an emotion's facial expression, label, and behavioral consequences to evoke preschoolers' knowledge of its cause. Cognitive Development. 2004 ; 19: 111-125
47. Widen S. C., Russell J. A. Handbook of emotions. Lewis M. Haviland-Jones J. M., ed. New York, NY: Guilford Press ; 2008a: 348-363.
48. Widen S. C., Russell J. A.. Children acquire emotion categories gradually. Cognitive Development. 2008b ; 23: 291-312
49. Widen S. C., Russell J. A.. Children's and adults' understanding of the "disgust face.". Cognition & Emotion. 2008c ; 22: 1513-1541
50. Widen S. C., Russell J. A.. Differentiation in preschooler's categories for emotion. Emotion. 2010a ; 10: 651-661
51. Widen S. C., Russell J. A.. Children's scripts for social emotions: Causes and consequences are more central than are facial expressions. British Journal of Developmental Psychology. 2010b ; 28: 565-581
52. Widen S. C., Russell J. A.. In building a script for an emotion, do preschoolers add its cause before its behavior consequence?. Social Development. 2011 ; 20: 471-485
53. WidenS. C.RussellJ. A. (2012a). Children's recognition of disgust in others. Manuscript submitted for publication.
54. WidenS. C.RussellJ. A. (2012b). Dynamic vs. still facial expressions: Do older children's free labeling responses show an advantage for one? Manuscript in preparation.
55. WidenS. C.RussellJ. A. (2012c). Testing the face inferiority effect in older children. Manuscript in preparation.
56. Wierzbicka A.. Language and metalanguage: Key issues in emotion research. Emotion Review. 2009 ; 1: 3-14