The ability to identify basic emotions from non-linguistic vocal bursts improves significantly with age from 5 to 17 years¶
Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · associationalr2·q3
Currency · newest study 2018 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person · overdue for a recheck since 2023: baselines and conditions change
Subclaims¶
Reading the evidence codes
q is the design tier, i the impact, n the sample, and the kind with its r
the rigour judged within that kind: what each code means.
This claim: no standardized effect is recorded in observations/ for it yet, so no benchmark reading is possible.
q3 i? Mixed-model logistic regression on forced-choice labeling of affective vocal bursts shows a highly significant effect of age on recognition accuracy in children and adolescents aged 5–17. → Grosbras 2018
Evidence¶
Grosbras 2018¶
Grosbras, M.-H., Ross, P. D. & Belin, P. (2018). Categorical emotion recognition from voice improves during childhood and adolescence. Scientific Reports 8, 14791. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-32868-3
q3 · i? · associational · r2
Cross-sectional mixed-model logistic regression on 225 participants aged 5–17 labeling affect bursts. The article reports the age effect as highly significant (Z = 5.52, p = 3.4 × 10−8); no effect size is printed, so impact is null.
"The effect of age was highly significant (Z = 5.52, p = 3.4 × 10−8). Adding a quadratic term (age2) improved the model fit: Chi-sq(1) = 5.14, p < 0.023"
Discussion¶
Related Claims¶
- Adult-level vocal emotion recognition performance is reached between 14 and 15 years of age, with a non-linear trajectory of faster childhood improvement followed by a late-adolescent plateau — a narrower finding that bears on this claim
- Children's average vocal emotion recognition performance is significantly below the adult group's average — a narrower finding that bears on this claim
- Testing procedure (individual computer with headphones vs small-group loudspeaker with paper response) does not affect vocal emotion recognition performance or the developmental trajectory — related
- Female children and adolescents recognize vocal emotions more accurately than males, with no interaction between sex and age — related
- Confusion patterns between vocal emotions are broadly stable across development: children miscategorize anger as fear, adolescents as sadness — related
- In CSCL written civic discussions, gaps exist between a composer's emotion labeling and others' emotion recognition — related
- Metacognitive efficiency at Grade 1 predicts children's performance improvement 10 months later in both a linguistic and a non-linguistic task — related
- Happiness is the easiest vocal emotion to recognize and anger the hardest, with anger and fear showing the greatest age-related improvement — a narrower finding that bears on this claim
Page metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
type |
claim |
id |
vocal-emotion-recognition-improves-age-5-17 |
title |
The ability to identify basic emotions from non-linguistic vocal bursts improves significantly with age from 5 to 17 years |
description |
The ability to identify basic emotions from non-linguistic vocal bursts improves significantly with age from 5 to 17 years |
status |
review |
evidence_strength |
moderate |
newest_evidence |
2018 |
recheck_by |
2023 |
generated |
by process:wiki-ingest on 2026-10-17 |
trust |
unverified — no one has confirmed this page's content |
sources |
1 — grosbras-2018 |
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