emotional development

Emotional Development Objectives

  • Objectives that guide the understanding of emotional development.

    • Understand how biology and culture affect emotional development.

    • Explore infant emotional development.

    • Learn about emotion regulation.

    • Examine the development of specific emotions.

What are Emotions?

  • Definition: Emotions are complex behaviors that encompass physiology, expression, and experience.

  • Functions of Emotions:

    • They play a role in establishing, maintaining, or disrupting social relations.

Physiology of Emotion

  • Emotions involve changes in the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS), which includes:

    • Breathing rate

    • Heart rate

    • Blood pressure

    • Perspiration

    • Pupil dilation

    • Skin responses

Infant Expression of Emotions

  • Infants express their emotions through:

    • Facial displays of basic emotions.

    • Crying as a primary means of expression.

    • Consideration of gender differences in expression was noted but not detailed.

Basic Emotions Identified

  • The following basic emotions are recognized universally:

    • Joy

    • Surprise

    • Anger

    • Sadness

    • Contempt

    • Disgust

    • Fear

Differences in Emotional Expression

  • Different demographics exhibit variations in emotional expression.

    • Gender differences indicate variability in emotional expression between females and males.

    • Age differences show changes in emotional expression as individuals age from 0-3 years, through 4-19 years, and into 20-69 years.

    • Diverse ethnic backgrounds (African, Asian, American, Caucasian) display different expressions of emotions.

  • Visual representations (Figures) from research (Fan et al., Nature, 2021) show results for:

    • Emotional expression based on gender and age across different ethnic demographics.

Infant Recognition of Emotion in Others

  • Infants can discriminate between different emotional expressions in:

    • Facial cues

    • Vocal tones

Role of Socialization in Emotional Development: The Still Face Paradigm

  • The Still Face Paradigm demonstrates social interactions:

    • Investigates the mean proportion of time spent looking at the mother during episodes and response to distress.

    • Results surmise the emotional impact of social interaction and the significance of social referencing in children (Tronick et al., 1978; Dicorcia et al., 2015).

Mother-Infant Interactions and Social Referencing

  • Importance of mother-infant interactions for emotional development:

    • Infants engage in social referencing, where they look to their caregivers for guidance in uncertain situations.

Cognitive-Social Approach to Emotions

  • Emotions viewed as byproducts of cognitive processing:

    • The process is delineated as follows: Event → Cognition → Emotional Response.

  • Explanation of children being socialized regarding the rules of emotional expression.

    • Example: A child learns to portray happiness during birthdays.

Functional Approach to Emotions

  • Emotions serve particular functions:

    • They help organize individual experiences.

    • Emotions are adaptive, aiding in survival and interaction with the environment.

Development of Specific Emotions

Smiling and Laughter Development

  • Exploration of how smiling and laughter evolve through interaction.

Environmental Influences on Smiling

  • Data on the mean number of smiles from infants in different environments:

    • Family, institution, kibbutz settings with varying frequency rates of smiles related to age in months.

Development of Negative Emotions: Fear

  • Development stages of fear in infants:

    • Fear of strangers begins around 3 months as wariness.

    • True fear develops by 9 months.

Biological Perspective on Emotions

  • Biological aspects regarding emotional development:

    • Genetic similarity among related individuals is observed.

    • Similar timelines for the onset of emotions across individuals.

    • Cross-cultural similarities in emotional experiences are noted.

Cross-Cultural Similarity in Separation Protest

  • Data representing the percentage of children who displayed distress when separated from mothers across various cultures:

    • African Bushman, Antiguan (Guatemala), Guatemalan Indian, Israeli kibbutzim demographics analyzed at various ages.

Cognitive Perspective on Emotional Development

  • Conceptual development drives the evolution of emotions:

    • Formation of new schemas aids emotional growth.

    • Greater understanding of causality is linked to social referencing.

Learning Perspective on Emotional Development

  • This perspective elucidates:

    • Differences in emotional expression among individuals.

    • Development of conditioned fear responses as a learned behavior.

Secondary Emotions

  • Recognition of higher-order emotions such as:

    • Pride

    • Guilt

    • Shame

    • These emotions emerge through social experiences and interactions.