"Show Me What You Got": The Nomological Network of the Ability to Pose Facial Emotion Expressions.

Just as receptive emotional abilities, productive emotional abilities are essential for social communication. Although individual differences in receptive emotional abilities, such as perceiving and recognizing emotions, are well-investigated, individual differences in productive emotional abilities, such as the ability to express emotions in the face, are largely neglected. Consequently, little is known about how emotion expression abilities fit in a nomological network of related abilities and typical behavior. We developed a multitask battery for measuring the ability to pose emotional expressions scored with facial expression recognition software. With three multivariate studies (n1 = 237; n2 = 141; n3 = 123), we test competing measurement models of emotion posing and relate this construct with other socio-emotional traits and cognitive abilities. We replicate the measurement model that includes a general factor of emotion posing, a nested task-specific factor, and emotion-specific factors. The emotion-posing ability factor is moderately to strongly related to receptive socio-emotional abilities, weakly related to general cognitive abilities, and weakly related to extraversion. This is strong evidence that emotion posing is a cognitive interpersonal ability. This new understanding of abilities in emotion communication opens a gateway for studying individual differences in social interaction.

Emotional abilities in preadolescents and adolescents with long-term cochlear implant use.

OBJECTIVES: Emotional abilities (EAs) are particularly important during preadolescence/adolescence, two challenging periods characterized by significant biological, physical, and cognitive changes. The present study attempted to a holistic EA approach in preadolescents/adolescents with cochlear implants (CI) and typical hearing (TH), considering various aspects such as perception, cognitive facilitation, comprehension, and management of emotions. A secondary aim was to identify significant demographic and audiological factors of EA development. METHODS: CI/TH groups were matched for chronological age, nonverbal IQ, gender, economic income, and maternal level of education. Each group consisted of 43 participants (age range 10-18 years). EAs were evaluated by using the multi-trait/method IE-ACCME test. Auditory-linguistic assessments included participants' lexical skills and Matrix performance as well. RESULTS: EA performance for perception and cognitive facilitation did not show any statistically significant CI/TH group differences (p > 0.05). Significant CI/TH differences emerged for emotion comprehension and management: CI group performed significantly worse in understanding emotional blends (t = 2.56, p = 0.014) but better in personal emotion management (t = -2.01, p = 0.048). For the CI group, gender showed statistically significant effects on cognitive facilitation in sensations, with males performing better than females (U = 129, p = 0.018). TH preadolescents showed significantly lower scores in understanding emotional changes in comparison to TH adolescents (U = 125.5, p = 0.01). Emotional blends understanding showed a weak negative correlation with Matrix performance (r = - 0.38, p = 0.013) and a moderate positive correlation with lexical skills (r = 0.40, p = 0.008). Relationships management showed various significant correlations: weak negative correlations with age at CI (r = - 0.38, p = 0.011) and Matrix performance (r = - 0.36, p = 0.016) as well as weak positive correlations with nonverbal-IQ (r = 0.38, p = 0.013) and positive moderate correlations with lexical skills (r = 0.49, p < 0.001). CONCLUSION: Cochlear implantation seems to show significant positive effects on emotional development in children, allowing them to achieve age appropriate EAs as they grow up and become preadolescents/adolescents. EA assessment in CI users may not only support monitorization of EA trajectory, but also early identification of any EA disorders, so that subjects with low EA profiles could be timely and properly intervened.

Cortical alterations after very preterm birth and the association with socio-emotional abilities from childhood to early adolescence.

Very preterm birth (VPT; <32 weeks' gestation) leads to a situation where crucial steps of brain development occur in an abnormal ex utero environment, translating to vulnerable cortical and subcortical development. Associated with this atypical brain development, children and adolescents born VPT are at a high risk of socio-emotional difficulties. In the current study, we unravel developmental changes in cortical gray matter (GM) concentration in VPT and term-born controls aged 6-14 years, together with their associations with socio-emotional abilities. T1-weighted images were used to estimate signal intensities of brain tissue types in a single voxel (GM, white matter, and cortico-spinal fluid) and extract GM concentration disentangled from the presence of partial volume effects (PVEs). General linear model analysis was used to compare groups. Socio-emotional abilities were assessed and associations with GM concentration were explored using univariate and multivariate analyses. The effects of prematurity were far-reaching, with intricated patterns of increases and decreases of GM concentration mainly in frontal, temporal, parietal, and cingular regions. Better socio-emotional abilities were associated with increased GM concentration in regions known to be involved in such process for both groups. Our findings suggest that the trajectory of brain development following VPT birth may be fundamentally distinctive and impact socio-emotional abilities.

Development and validation of the first adaptive test of emotion perception in music.

ABSTRACTThe Musical Emotion Discrimination Task (MEDT) is a short, non-adaptive test of the ability to discriminate emotions in music. Test-takers hear two performances of the same melody, both played by the same performer but each trying to communicate a different basic emotion, and are asked to determine which one is "happier", for example. The goal of the current study was to construct a new version of the MEDT using a larger set of shorter, more diverse music clips and an adaptive framework to expand the ability range for which the test can deliver measurements. The first study analysed responses from a large sample of participants (N = 624) to determine how musical features contributed to item difficulty, which resulted in a quantitative model of musical emotion discrimination ability rooted in Item Response Theory (IRT). This model informed the construction of the adaptive MEDT. A second study contributed preliminary evidence for the validity and reliability of the adaptive MEDT, and demonstrated that the new version of the test is suitable for a wider range of abilities. This paper therefore presents the first adaptive musical emotion discrimination test, a new resource for investigating emotion processing which is freely available for research use.

Preschoolers' Sensitivity to Negative and Positive Emotional Facial Expressions: An ERP Study.

The study examined processing differences for facial expressions (happy, angry, or neutral) and their repetition with early (P1, N170) and late (P3) event-related potentials (ERPs) in young children (N = 33). EEG was recorded while children observed sequentially presented pairs of facial expressions, which were either the same (repeated trials) or differed in their emotion (novel trials). We also correlated ERP amplitude differences with parental and child measures of socio-emotional competence (emotion recognition, empathy). P1 amplitudes were increased for angry and happy as compared to neutral expressions. We also detected larger P3 amplitudes for angry expressions as compared to happy or neutral expressions. Repetition effects were evident at early and late processing stages marked by reduced P1 amplitudes for repeated vs. novel happy expressions, but enhanced P3 amplitudes for repeated vs. novel facial expressions. N170 amplitudes were neither modulated by facial expressions nor their repetition. None of the repetition effects were associated with measures of socio-emotional competence. Taken together, negative facial expressions led to increased neural activations in early and later processing stages, indicative of enhanced saliency to potential threating stimuli in young children. Processing of repeated facial expression seem to be differential for early and late neural stages: Reduced activation was detected at early neural processing stages particularly for happy faces, indicative of effective processing for an emotion, which is most familiar within this age range. Contrary to our hypothesis, enhanced activity for repeated vs. novel expression independent of a particular emotion were detected at later processing stages, which may be linked to the creation of new memory traces. Early and late repetition effects are discussed in light of developmental and perceptual differences as well as task-specific load.

Are People-Centered Intelligences Psychometrically Distinct from Thing-Centered Intelligences? A Meta-Analysis.

The Cattell-Horn-Carroll (CHC) or three-stratum model of intelligence envisions human intelligence as a hierarchy. General intelligence (g) is situated at the top, under which are a group of broad intelligences such as verbal, visuospatial processing, and quantitative knowledge that pertain to more specific areas of reasoning. Some broad intelligences are people-centered, including personal, emotional, and social intelligences; others concern reasoning about things more generally, such as visuospatial and quantitative knowledge. In the present research, we conducted a meta-analysis of 87 studies, including 2322 effect sizes, to examine the average correlation between people-to-people intelligences relative to the average correlation between people-to-thing-centered intelligences (and similar comparisons). Results clearly support the psychometric distinction between people-centered and thing-centered mental abilities. Coupled with evidence for incremental predictions from people-centered intelligences, our findings provide a secure foundation for continued research focused on people-centered mental abilities.

The Good, the Bad, and the Clever: Faking Ability as a Socio-Emotional Ability?

Socio-emotional abilities have been proposed as an extension to models of intelligence, but earlier measurement approaches have either not fulfilled criteria of ability measurement or have covered only predominantly receptive abilities. We argue that faking ability-the ability to adjust responses on questionnaires to present oneself in a desired manner-is a socio-emotional ability that can broaden our understanding of these abilities and intelligence in general. To test this theory, we developed new instruments to measure the ability to fake bad (malingering) and administered them jointly with established tests of faking good ability in a general sample of n = 134. Participants also completed multiple tests of emotion perception along with tests of emotion expression posing, pain expression regulation, and working memory capacity. We found that individual differences in faking ability tests are best explained by a general factor that had a large correlation with receptive socio-emotional abilities and had a zero to medium-sized correlation with different productive socio-emotional abilities. All correlations were still small after controlling these effects for shared variance with general mental ability as indicated by tests of working memory capacity. We conclude that faking ability is indeed correlated meaningfully with other socio-emotional abilities and discuss the implications for intelligence research and applied ability assessment.

Callous-Unemotional Features are Associated with Emotion Recognition Impairments in Young ODD Children with Low but not High Affective Arousal.

Despite increasing support for the distinction between primary and secondary variants of callous-unemotional features in children with disruptive behavioural disorders, evidence about whether emotion recognition deficits are only characteristic of primary CU is inconclusive. We tested whether, in young children with Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD; N = 74), level of affective arousal moderated the association between CU and performance on behavioural measures of emotional abilities. The association between CU and emotion recognition abilities was dependent on the child's level of affective arousal with higher CU associated with poorer emotion recognition abilities for ODD children with lower affective arousal (r = - 0.49; p = .007) but not for those with higher levels (r = 0.03; p = .838). Our results replicate recent findings and give support to the notion that the primary CU variant is characterised emotionally by under arousal of affect, low affect dysregulation and impaired emotion recognition abilities.

Impact of work aspects on communication, emotional intelligence and empathy in nursing / Efeito dos aspectos trabalhistas na comunicação, inteligência emocional e empatia em enfermagem / Efecto de los aspectos laborales sobre la comunicación, la inteligencia emocional y la empatía en enfermería

ABSTRACT Objective: to assess the impact of the type of contract and seniority of nursing staff on their attitudes towards communication, emotional intelligence and empathy. Methods: the instruments measuring attitudes towards communication, empathy and emotional intelligence. The study sample was composed of 450 nurses from 7 hospitals. To explore the effect of the variables studied, one-factor ANOVA test, Pearson correlations and hierarchical multiple linear regression models were performed according to the type of contract. Results: there are statistically significant differences between the variables studied according to the type of contract. More specifically, the nursing staff with permanent contract showed higher scores in the cognitive dimension of the scale attitudes towards communication. Likewise, the highest correlations were found among the dimensions of attitudes towards communication in all the groups. At the same time, seniority was positively related to emotional intelligence in the interim and negatively related to empathy in the permanent contract. Finally, regarding the regression models, it was observed that the perspective taken is the main predictor of each dimension of attitudes towards communication in all the groups, regardless of the type of contract. Conclusion: positive working conditions (job security, permanent contract and seniority) have been found to influence the communication skills in the patient-nurse relationship.

RESUMO Objetivo: determinar o impacto do tipo de contrato e do tempo de serviço prestado da equipe de enfermagem nas suas atitudes em relação à comunicação, inteligência emocional e empatia. Métodos: os instrumentos que avaliam as atitudes em relação à comunicação, empatia e inteligência emocional. A amostra do estudo consistiu de 450 enfermeiras de 7 hospitais. Para avaliar o efeito das variáveis estudadas, foram realizados ANOVA unilateral, correlações de Pearson e modelos de regressão linear hierárquica múltipla, de acordo com o tipo de contrato. Resultados: há diferenças estatisticamente significativas entre as variáveis estudadas de acordo com o tipo de contrato. Mais especificamente, a equipe de enfermagem com contrato permanente apresentou pontuações mais elevadas na dimensão cognitiva da escala atitudes em relação à comunicação. Do mesmo modo, as maiores correlações foram encontradas entre as dimensões da escala atitudes em relação à comunicação, em todos os grupos. Ao mesmo tempo, o tempo de serviço foi positivamente relacionado à inteligência emocional no contrato provisório, e negativamente com a empatia no contrato permanente. Por fim, observando os modelos de regressão, observou-se que a tomada de perspectiva é a principal preditora em cada dimensão da escala atitudes em relação à comunicação em todos os grupos, independentemente do tipo de contrato. Conclusão: comprovou-se que condições de trabalho positivas (segurança no trabalho, contrato permanente e tempo de serviço prestado) influenciam a capacidade de comunicação na relação paciente-enfermeira.

RESUMEN Objetivo: determinar el impacto del tipo de contrato y la antigüedad del personal de enfermería en sus actitudes hacia la comunicación, la inteligencia emocional y la empatía. Métodos: los instrumentos que miden las actitudes hacia la comunicación, la empatía y la inteligencia emocional. La muestra del estudio fue de 450 enfermeras de 7 hospitales. Para comprobar el efecto de las variables estudiadas, se realizaron ANOVA de un factor, correlaciones Pearson y modelos de regresión lineal jerárquica múltiple, según el tipo de contrato. Resultados: existen diferencias estadísticamente significativas entre las variables estudiadas según el tipo de contrato. Más concretamente, el personal de enfermería con contrato indefinido mostró puntuaciones más altas en la dimensión cognitiva de la escala actitudes hacia la comunicación. Asimismo, las mayores correlaciones se encontraron entre las dimensiones de la escala actitudes hacia la comunicación en todos los grupos. Al mismo tiempo, la antigüedad se relacionaba positivamente con la inteligencia emocional en el ínterin y negativamente con la empatía en el contrato indefinido. Finalmente, mirando los modelos de regresión, se observó que la toma de perspectiva es el principal predictor de cada dimensión de la escala actitudes hacia la comunicación en todos los grupos, independientemente del tipo de contrato. Conclusión: se ha comprobado que las condiciones de trabajo positivas (seguridad laboral, contrato permanente y antigüedad) influyen en la capacidad de comunicación en la relación paciente-enfermera.

Predicción de comportamientos suicidas y autolesiones no suicidas en adolescentes argentinos / Prediction of suicidal behaviors and non suicidal sel-injury in Argentinian adolescents

Actualmente uno de los debates centrales en el campo de la suicidología refiere a si los comportamientos suicidas y las autolesiones no suicidas (NSSI) representan clusters diferentes o un continuum en el espectro autodestructivo. Si se las considerara entidades nosológicas separadas debiera ser factible identificar características diferenciales entre ellas de manera que, por ejemplo, fuera posible predecir en qué casos de NSSI sería más probable que un adolescente cometiera un intento suicida. Este estudio se propuso establecer la capacidad predictiva de habilidades emocionales e interpersonales para ambos tipos de comportamientos. Para ello se administraron el Inventario de Orientaciones Suicidas ISO-30, la Escala Rasgo de Metaconocimientos sobre Estados Emocionales TMMS-24 y las escalas Recursos Sociales de las Escalas de Recursos Psicológicos a 510 adolescentes escolarizados de la ciudad de Mar del Plata, Argentina. Se seleccionaron 81 casos con autolesiones no suicidas (Grupo NSSI) y 61 con ideaciones suicidas (Grupo IS). Los resultados muestran que los modelos de regresión obtenidos para cada grupo son diferentes. El ajuste general del modelo del Grupo IS resultó adecuado (χ² = 10.54; p = .22), los coeficientes de determinación revelan una capacidad explicativa que da cuenta de entre un 25 y 46% de la varianza total y la variable de mayor peso en el modelo fue la Incapacidad para Pedir Ayuda. En cambio el modelo del grupo NSSI mostró un pobre ajuste y solamente quedaron incluidas las variables emocionales. Se discuten los resultados según consecuencias aplicadas y futuras líneas de investigación.

Currently, one of the central debates in the field of suicidology refers to whether suicidal behavior and non suicidal self-injury (NSSI) represent different clusters or a continuum in the self-harm spectrum. The first approach, which runs in the same line than DSM-5, defines the NSSI as self-inflected injuries on any surface the own body with the goal of releasing negative thought or feelings, as a reaction to an interpersonal conflict, aiming at the achievement of a positive affective state, clearly understanding that in any case these injuries could cause death. The second approach states that the non-suicidal qualification represents a restriction and is potentially dangerous, given the close link between NSSI and suicidal behavior. If they were separate nosological entities it should be possible to identify differential features in each one. Literature focused on the study of pathological variables, suggest that it seems to be a difference of degree rather than qualitative since adolescents showing suicidal behaviors report more severe psychopathological symptoms, more depression, more hopelessness and loneliness, many family conflicts, and finding less reasons to stay alive compared to those who only exhibit NSSI. These data, somehow, offer support to both approaches. Following this debate, this study aimed at establishing the predictive value of emotional and interpersonal skills as inde-pendent variables for both types of behaviors. The selection of these variables was based on previous research findings, which provide robust evidence regarding the huge difficulties showed by adolescents with suicidal behaviors and NSSI in emotional expression and regulation. As for of interpersonal variables, diverse studies offer consistent results about the low perception of social support, the presence of intense feeling of loneliness and alienation, as well as the communication difficulties manifested by adolescents with suicidal behaviors. Based on this background, the hypothesis states that such difficulties with emotional skills will be useful predictors for both groups, only showing differences of degree. This way, adolescents with NSSI will show fewer difficulties in this aspect than the suicidal ideation group; mean while difficulties in interpersonal skills will arise as predictors only for the suicidal ideation group. The Inventory for Suicidal Orientations, the Trait Meta-Mood Scale and the Social Resources Scales from the Psychological Resources Scales were used to examine to 510 adolescent students from the city of Mar del Plata, Argentina. From the total sample, 142 participants were selected and separated into two groups. Suicidal Ideation Group -IS- (82% females, M = 16.16; SD = 1.11) accomplished at least one of the following criteria for high suicidal risk with active suicidal ideation: a) total score of ISO-30 ≥ 45; b) score ≥ 2 in the item #30 of the ISO-30 scale, "If my problems get worst, I will kill myself"; c) score≥ 1 in item 30 and total score ≥ 37 (P 84) in ISO-30, or d) explicit information on ideation and/or suicidal attempt in responses to personal data survey. The other group -NSSI- was composed of 81 cases (71.6% females, M = 16.35; SD =1.13) according to the following criteria: (a) having reported self-injury thoughts and/or committing self-injuries; (b) not achieving any of the 4 criteria established for the suicidal ideation group. Results identified different regression models for each group. The overall fit showed for IS-Group model was adequate (χ²= 10.54; p =.22). As for coefficients of determination reported, 25 to 46% of the total variance was explained, and the inability to ask for help played a major role within predictive variables. Instead, the model for the NSSI Group achieved a poor fit, including only emotional variables, as hypothesized. Results and further research lines are discussed.

Emotional abilities and HbA1c levels in patients with type 1 diabetes.

In recent years a growing body of research is focused on the relationships between emotions and health. When it comes to diabetes, findings suggest that distress might play a key role in the acquisition and maintenance of health habits associated with diabetic management. This report describes two studies examining the roles of emotional abilities in diabetic management from two different conceptual points of view using two culturally different samples. In study 1, we examined the relationship between emotional intelligence and HbA1c levels in a sample of eighty-five patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus (DM1) in Israel. In study 2, we examined the relationship between specific emotional regulation strategies and HbA1c in sixty-seven adolescents with DM1, while examining the mediating role of distress in this association. The results showed a negative association between emotional intelligence and HbA1c levels, even after controlling for potential intervening factors. We found that the relationship between difficulties in emotion regulation and HbA1c seemed to be mediated by diabetes-related distress. These findings may aid in the design of psychological models for future research as well as interventions aimed at improving emotional abilities in people with DM1.

Face and emotion expression processing and the serotonin transporter polymorphism 5-HTTLPR/rs22531.

Face cognition, including face identity and facial expression processing, is a crucial component of socio-emotional abilities, characterizing humans as highest developed social beings. However, for these trait domains molecular genetic studies investigating gene-behavior associations based on well-founded phenotype definitions are still rare. We examined the relationship between 5-HTTLPR/rs25531 polymorphisms - related to serotonin-reuptake - and the ability to perceive and recognize faces and emotional expressions in human faces. For this aim we conducted structural equation modeling on data from 230 young adults, obtained by using a comprehensive, multivariate task battery with maximal effort tasks. By additionally modeling fluid intelligence and immediate and delayed memory factors, we aimed to address the discriminant relationships of the 5-HTTLPR/rs25531 polymorphisms with socio-emotional abilities. We found a robust association between the 5-HTTLPR/rs25531 polymorphism and facial emotion perception. Carriers of two long (L) alleles outperformed carriers of one or two S alleles. Weaker associations were present for face identity perception and memory for emotional facial expressions. There was no association between the 5-HTTLPR/rs25531 polymorphism and non-social abilities, demonstrating discriminant validity of the relationships. We discuss the implications and possible neural mechanisms underlying these novel findings.