Infants' causal understanding of facial expressions of emotions

2014 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 24650131
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Cognitive science
• Research Institution: The University of Tokyo
• Principal Investigator: HARYU Etsuko 東京大学, 教育学研究科(研究院), 准教授 (70276004)
• Project Period (FY): 2012-04-01 – 2015-03-31
• Keywords: 表情 / 乳児 / 他者特性理解 / 行動予測 / 援助行動 / 印象形成

Outline of Final Research Achievements

We human beings use facial expressions of emotions to fine-tune our attitude to the expressor. The present study investigated from when infants exhibit this ability by testing 4- to 14-month-old infants. The results indicated that (1) 4-month-olds are able to perceptually categorize happy faces and angry faces, respectively, which are displayed by different individuals, (2) that an individual who now shows a neutral face but once displayed a happy face is preferred by 6-month-olds over other individuals who once displayed an angry face, and (3) that 10-month-olds predict that an individual with an angry face do not help other people attain goals, whereas they do not predict that an individual with a happy face is more likely to help others than other individuals with an angry face.

Free Research Field

コミュニケーション能力の発達