Can young children capture sadness or joy on faces with a mask?

The Covid-19 Pandemia that has forced us to carry a mask has made it more difficult not only than the people who know each other identify between them when they cross the street but also the detection of smiles and other facial expressions.Looking closely at the non -covered part of the face is feasible for adult people to infer if the person in front of them exhibits a facial expression of sadness or joy.Our experience of years watching faces helps us.But and very young children?To what extent are they able to recognize in a face with a mask sadness or joy?In an investigation, it has been tried to answer this question, which is not inconsequential because there is fear that ceasing to completely perceive many faces can negatively influence the normal development of the social interaction skills of young children.

Monica Gori, Lucia Schiatti and Maria Bianca Amadeo, the three of the Italian Institute of (IIT), have verified that children aged 3 to 5 are able to recognize hidden emotions under facial masks only in 40% of the occasions.

The percentages are higher in other age groups: children from 6 to 8 years (55-65%) and adults (70-80%) but, in general, all age groups showed some difficulty to correctly interpret those expressed emotions correctlyon a face while it was partially covered by a facial mask.As for the other emotions, the results were better, but clearly the age group that is most difficult to recognize the emotions expressed from behind a facial mask is that of preschool children.

The researchers of the Italian Dehan Institute proven that children aged 3 to 5 are able to correctly capture facial expressions of joy and sadness in people carrying a mask in just 40 percent of the occasions.(Photos: L.Taverna / Iit (Italian isituto di technology))

"The experiment was conducted in the early stages of the Pandemia of 2020, and at that time the masks were still a new experience for almost anyone," says Gori, "the brain of children is very flexible, and at this time we are doingTests to verify whether the understanding of emotions by children has increased or not ".

The study is entitled "Masking Emots: Face Masks Impair How We Read Emots".And it has been published in the academic magazine Frontiers in Psychology.(Source: Amazings NCYT)