DEVELOPMENTAL-TRENDS IN EMOTION UNDERSTANDING AMONG A DIVERSE SAMPLE OF AFRICAN-AMERICAN PRESCHOOL-CHILDREN

The contributions of age and cognitive-language skills to children's e motion understanding (e.g., recognition of facial expression and under standing of contextual cues for five basic emotions: happy, sad, mad, scared, and surprised; as well as children's application of their unde rstanding of emotions to hypothetical situations requiring them to cop e with maternal anger) were examined in a sample of 45 preschool-aged African-American children. These children came from diverse SES and pa renting backgrounds, with a heavy concentration of the sample from dis advantaged homes. The results were similar to studies of Caucasian chi ldren. Specifically, the results indicated that both age and cognitive -language skills contribute to children's emotional understanding. How ever, the contribution of age to emotion understanding was more consis tent than the contribution of cognitive-language skills. Judgments of anger showed an age-related increase in accuracy in the contextual cue condition but not in the facial cue condition. Compared to other samp les, children in this study were fairly accurate at judging and identi fying fear. The results are discussed in terms of parent emotion socia lization practices and implications for children's emotional developme nt.