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Constructing emotion categorization: Insights from developmental psychology applied to a young adult sample.

Publication ,  Journal Article
Ruba, AL; Wilbourn, MP; Ulrich, DM; Harris, LT
Published in: Emotion (Washington, D.C.)
October 2018

Previous research has found that the categorization of emotional facial expressions is influenced by a variety of factors, such as processing time, facial mimicry, emotion labels, and perceptual cues. However, past research has frequently confounded these factors, making it impossible to ascertain how adults use this varied information to categorize emotions. The current study is the first to explore the magnitude of impact for each of these factors on emotion categorization in the same paradigm. Participants (N = 102) categorized anger and disgust emotional facial expressions in a novel computerized task, modeled on similar tasks in the developmental literature with preverbal infants. Experimental conditions manipulated (a) whether the task was time-restricted, and (b) whether the labels "anger" and "disgust" were used in the instructions. Participants were significantly more accurate when provided with unlimited response time and emotion labels. Participants who were given restricted sorting time (2s) and no emotion labels tended to focus on perceptual features of the faces when categorizing the emotions, which led to low sorting accuracy. In addition, facial mimicry related to greater sorting accuracy. These results suggest that when high-level (labeling) categorization strategies are unavailable, adults use low-level (perceptual) strategies to categorize facial expressions. Methodological implications for the study of emotion are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).

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Published In

Emotion (Washington, D.C.)

DOI

EISSN

1931-1516

ISSN

1528-3542

Publication Date

October 2018

Volume

18

Issue

7

Start / End Page

1043 / 1051

Related Subject Headings

  • Psychology, Developmental
  • Male
  • Humans
  • Female
  • Facial Expression
  • Experimental Psychology
  • Emotions
  • 52 Psychology
  • 1702 Cognitive Sciences
  • 1701 Psychology
 

Citation

APA
Chicago
ICMJE
MLA
NLM
Ruba, A. L., Wilbourn, M. P., Ulrich, D. M., & Harris, L. T. (2018). Constructing emotion categorization: Insights from developmental psychology applied to a young adult sample. Emotion (Washington, D.C.), 18(7), 1043–1051. https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0000364
Ruba, Ashley L., Makeba Parramore Wilbourn, Devin M. Ulrich, and Lasana T. Harris. “Constructing emotion categorization: Insights from developmental psychology applied to a young adult sample.Emotion (Washington, D.C.) 18, no. 7 (October 2018): 1043–51. https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0000364.
Ruba AL, Wilbourn MP, Ulrich DM, Harris LT. Constructing emotion categorization: Insights from developmental psychology applied to a young adult sample. Emotion (Washington, DC). 2018 Oct;18(7):1043–51.
Ruba, Ashley L., et al. “Constructing emotion categorization: Insights from developmental psychology applied to a young adult sample.Emotion (Washington, D.C.), vol. 18, no. 7, Oct. 2018, pp. 1043–51. Epmc, doi:10.1037/emo0000364.
Ruba AL, Wilbourn MP, Ulrich DM, Harris LT. Constructing emotion categorization: Insights from developmental psychology applied to a young adult sample. Emotion (Washington, DC). 2018 Oct;18(7):1043–1051.

Published In

Emotion (Washington, D.C.)

DOI

EISSN

1931-1516

ISSN

1528-3542

Publication Date

October 2018

Volume

18

Issue

7

Start / End Page

1043 / 1051

Related Subject Headings

  • Psychology, Developmental
  • Male
  • Humans
  • Female
  • Facial Expression
  • Experimental Psychology
  • Emotions
  • 52 Psychology
  • 1702 Cognitive Sciences
  • 1701 Psychology