I Can Relate: A Four-Wave Examination of Children's and Parents' Emoter-Referent Talk About Discrete Emotions
This study examined the development of emotion understanding. Children (N = 296, 157 boys, 139 girls) and parents (67% White, 8% Black, 15% Hispanic, 2% Asian American, 6% Biracial, 2% "Other") recruited from Denver, Colorado were observed annually for four years starting in 2019 (beginning M<sub>age</sub> = 2.44 years, SD = 0.26) discussing a wordless storybook featuring illustrated emoters expressing joy, sadness, fear, anger, or disgust towards a referent (e.g., dropped ice cream). Analyses revealed changes and bidirectional relations in children's and parents' emoter talk and referent talk across early childhood, as well as differences in parent and child relative emoter-referent emphasis for discrete emotions. Implications for the ontogeny and socialization of young children's emotion understanding will be discussed.
Authors
- Lindsay McMurray
- Ashley M. Fraser (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2002-3512)
- Amberly King
- Christin L. Porter (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6359-6951)
- Jamon Jex
- Brandon N. Clifford (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7070-8133)
- Peter J. Reschke (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1711-8385)
- Eric A. Walle (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0719-0834)
- Mindy A. Brown (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5902-1899)
- Ethan T. Strang
- Brooklyn Daines Coleman
Institutions
- Brigham Young University (US)
- University of California, Merced (US)
- Arizona State University (US)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Child Development
- Published
- 2025-08-04
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.70021
- Primary Topic
- Emotions and Moral Behavior
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00