Facial affect recognition across the adult life span

Introduction: The results of the researches have shown expression and recognition of emotion are two of the basic skills on which normal social interaction is based. As people grow older, they may become wiser and more experienced in interacting with other people, but they can also experience memory loss and cognitive slow-down, influencing the quality of relations in their daily routines. Experimental studies indicate that facial affect recognition, particularly negative emotions, decreases with age. However, there is no consensus at with age the decrease in emotion recognition begin, and how selective this is to negative emotions. Material and method: In the current study, 86 participants ranging in age from 18 to 65 years were asked to recognize emotion expressed facially with pictures of facial affect (Ekman and Friesen, 1976). Findings: in general, older participants were found to be less accurate at recognizing emotions with the most distinctive age difference pertaining to a certain group of negative emotions. Result revealed an age related decline in the recognition of sadness, fear, surprise and disgust, starting at about 40 years of age.  Discussion and conclusion: implication of age-related differences in facial emotion expression and early onset of the selective decrease in emotion recognition are discussed in terms of previous findings, relevant theoretical model and studies from the neuropsychological and functional imaging literature that indicate the separate brain regions underlie these emotions.