Development of perceptual expertise in emotion recognition

Abstract

How do children's early social experiences influence their perception of emotion-specific information communicated by the face? To examine this question, we tested a group of abused children who had been exposed to extremely high levels of parental anger expression and physical threat. Children were presented with arrays of stimuli that depicted the unfolding of facial expressions, from neutrality to peak emotions. The abused children accurately recognized anger early in the formation of the facial expression, when few physiological cues were available. The speed of children's recognition was associated with the degree of anger/hostility reported by the child's parent. These data highlight the ways in which perceptual learning can shape the timing of emotion perception.

Figure 1

Examples from the stimulus array for (top to bottom) models creating scared, sad, happy, surprised, and angry facial expressions. Note to Reviewers: The full stimulus set and both child and adult ratings of each exemplar can be made available during the review process and/or posted as on-line supplementary material.

Figure 2

Recognition functions of abused and control children for facial displays as a function of percent of peak emotional expression.