From emotion to action: developmental differences in linking discrete emotions to behaviour

Understanding how discrete emotional experiences correspond with their likely behavioural responses is essential for navigating social interactions. While emotion understanding is typically examined via emotion labels, appreciation for the behaviours associated with emotions remains understudied, particularly in early development. This study explored 4- and 5-year-old children’s and college students’ understanding of behavioural consequences associated with anger, disgust, fear, and sadness using a novel task with minimal verbal demands and no emotion labels. Participants viewed illustrated stories depicting emotion-eliciting events and selected a matching behavioural consequence. Each target behaviour was based on prior research (Frijda et al., 1989. Relations among emotion, appraisal, and emotional action readiness. <i>Journal of Personality and Social Psychology</i>, <i>57</i>(2), 212–228. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.57.2.212) examining action tendencies associated with discrete emotions. Results showed that older children and college students performed above chance for selecting the target behavioural response for disgust and sadness, whereas younger children did not. Additionally, younger and older children selected the target behaviour for anger above chance, but college students performed significantly below chance. No age group matched the target behaviour for fear above chance. These findings highlight age-related differences in associating behavioural consequences with emotions. Moreover, the visual measure limiting verbal demands and explicit emotion labels provides exciting possibilities to broaden our knowledge of the behavioural consequences of emotions in young populations.