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Updated: Jun 25, 2026
08:31
Conscious and Non-conscious Representations of Emotional Faces in Asperger's Syndrome
Published on: July 31, 2016
Older adults respond quickly to angry faces despite labeling difficulty.
Ted Ruffman1, Michelle Ng, Thomas Jenkin
1Department of Psychology, University of Otago, Box 56, Dunedin 9056, New Zealand. tedr@psy.otago.ac.nz
Summary
Older adults identify angry faces faster but struggle to label them correctly. This research highlights age-related differences in emotion recognition and labeling accuracy.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Neuroscience
- Gerontology
Background:
- Age-related cognitive changes can impact social cognition.
- Understanding emotion recognition across the lifespan is crucial for gerontology.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate age differences in identifying and labeling emotion expressions.
- To compare young and older adults' performance on emotion perception tasks.
Main Methods:
- Two experiments were conducted using arrays of faces (schematic and real).
- Participants identified discrepant emotion faces and labeled emotion expressions.
- Performance was compared between young and older adult groups.
Main Results:
- Both age groups were faster at identifying angry faces.
- Older adults showed significantly lower accuracy in labeling angry schematic faces.
- Older adults also had greater difficulty labeling angry and sad real faces.
Conclusions:
- No age differences exist in the speed of identifying discrepant angry faces.
- Older adults exhibit deficits in accurately labeling angry and sad facial expressions.
- These findings suggest specific challenges in emotion labeling for older adults.
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