Abstract
The ability to recognize emotions undergoes major developmental changes from infancy to adolescence, peaking in early adulthood, and declining with aging. A life span approach to emotion recognition is lacking in the auditory domain, and it remains unclear how the speaker's and listener's ages interact in the context of decoding vocal emotions. Here, we examined age-related differences in vocal emotion recognition from childhood until older adulthood and tested for a potential own-age bias in performance. A total of 164 participants (36 children [7-11 years], 53 adolescents [12-17 years], 48 young adults [20-30 years], 27 older adults [58-82 years]) completed a forced-choice emotion categorization task with nonverbal vocalizations expressing pleasure, relief, achievement, happiness, sadness, disgust, anger, fear, surprise, and neutrality. These vocalizations were produced by 16 speakers, 4 from each age group (children [8-11 years], adolescents [14-16 years], young adults [19-23 years], older adults [60-75 years]). Accuracy in vocal emotion recognition improved from childhood to early adulthood and declined in older adults. Moreover, patterns of improvement and decline differed by emotion category: faster development for pleasure, relief, sadness, and surprise and delayed decline for fear and surprise. Vocal emotions produced by older adults were more difficult to recognize when compared to all other age groups. No evidence for an own-age bias was found, except in children. These findings support effects of both speaker and listener ages on how vocal emotions are decoded and inform current models of vocal emotion perception. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Journal | Emotion |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | E-pub ahead of print - 24 Oct 2019 |
Cite this
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Changes in vocal emotion recognition across the life span. / Amorim, Maria; Anikin, Andrey; Mendes, Augusto J; Lima, César F; Kotz, Sonja A.; Pinheiro, Ana P.
In: Emotion, 24.10.2019.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Academic › peer-review
TY - JOUR
T1 - Changes in vocal emotion recognition across the life span
AU - Amorim, Maria
AU - Anikin, Andrey
AU - Mendes, Augusto J
AU - Lima, César F
AU - Kotz, Sonja A.
AU - Pinheiro, Ana P.
PY - 2019/10/24
Y1 - 2019/10/24
N2 - The ability to recognize emotions undergoes major developmental changes from infancy to adolescence, peaking in early adulthood, and declining with aging. A life span approach to emotion recognition is lacking in the auditory domain, and it remains unclear how the speaker's and listener's ages interact in the context of decoding vocal emotions. Here, we examined age-related differences in vocal emotion recognition from childhood until older adulthood and tested for a potential own-age bias in performance. A total of 164 participants (36 children [7-11 years], 53 adolescents [12-17 years], 48 young adults [20-30 years], 27 older adults [58-82 years]) completed a forced-choice emotion categorization task with nonverbal vocalizations expressing pleasure, relief, achievement, happiness, sadness, disgust, anger, fear, surprise, and neutrality. These vocalizations were produced by 16 speakers, 4 from each age group (children [8-11 years], adolescents [14-16 years], young adults [19-23 years], older adults [60-75 years]). Accuracy in vocal emotion recognition improved from childhood to early adulthood and declined in older adults. Moreover, patterns of improvement and decline differed by emotion category: faster development for pleasure, relief, sadness, and surprise and delayed decline for fear and surprise. Vocal emotions produced by older adults were more difficult to recognize when compared to all other age groups. No evidence for an own-age bias was found, except in children. These findings support effects of both speaker and listener ages on how vocal emotions are decoded and inform current models of vocal emotion perception. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
AB - The ability to recognize emotions undergoes major developmental changes from infancy to adolescence, peaking in early adulthood, and declining with aging. A life span approach to emotion recognition is lacking in the auditory domain, and it remains unclear how the speaker's and listener's ages interact in the context of decoding vocal emotions. Here, we examined age-related differences in vocal emotion recognition from childhood until older adulthood and tested for a potential own-age bias in performance. A total of 164 participants (36 children [7-11 years], 53 adolescents [12-17 years], 48 young adults [20-30 years], 27 older adults [58-82 years]) completed a forced-choice emotion categorization task with nonverbal vocalizations expressing pleasure, relief, achievement, happiness, sadness, disgust, anger, fear, surprise, and neutrality. These vocalizations were produced by 16 speakers, 4 from each age group (children [8-11 years], adolescents [14-16 years], young adults [19-23 years], older adults [60-75 years]). Accuracy in vocal emotion recognition improved from childhood to early adulthood and declined in older adults. Moreover, patterns of improvement and decline differed by emotion category: faster development for pleasure, relief, sadness, and surprise and delayed decline for fear and surprise. Vocal emotions produced by older adults were more difficult to recognize when compared to all other age groups. No evidence for an own-age bias was found, except in children. These findings support effects of both speaker and listener ages on how vocal emotions are decoded and inform current models of vocal emotion perception. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
U2 - 10.1037/emo0000692
DO - 10.1037/emo0000692
M3 - Article
C2 - 31647283
JO - Emotion
JF - Emotion
SN - 1528-3542
ER -