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Experimental Psychology (Russia)
2025. Vol. 18, no. 4, 80–101
doi:10.17759/exppsy.2025180405
ISSN: 2072-7593 / 2311-7036 (online)

Categorization of dynamic expressions of basic emotions in children of primary and secondary school age

 
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Abstract

The problem of defining and understanding the emotional process of children in the presented work the solution within the framework of the study of categorization of the rate of expression of basic emotions in children of primary and secondary school age. Two resistances were put forward: the categorization of dynamic basic emotions by children of primary and middle school age is characterized by the peculiarities of the relationships between the assessments of dynamic expressions of basic emotions and their verbal designations; the categorization of dynamic expressions and verbal designations of basic emotions in children of middle school age will be more accurate, in contrast to the assessments of children of primary school age.. The theoretical basis for the research was the provisions of the scientific school of V.A. Barabanshchikov, within which the categorization of emotions can be considered as an intellectual-perceptual phenomenon. Children of primary school age (22 people) and senior school age (25 people) participated in the study. We will offer both groups stimulating material in the form of stimulating expressions of basic emotions from the Child-EFES (CEFES) Database. After involving the stimulus material, the respondents included the semantic differential (children's version) of events — direct impact on the expression of basic emotions and then their verbal designations, children of middle school age, additionally used the alternative choice technique. Significant connections were revealed between the level of increase in expression and verbal symbolic basic emotions, as regards the number of connections in younger schoolchildren than in children of middle school age. However, younger schoolchildren are characterized by the description of different basic emotions by one scale. Differences in the indicators of verbal designations of basic emotions between students of the first and fifth grades were revealed for six basic forces — “fear", “calmness”, “surprise”, “contempt”, “sadness”, “disgust”. The greatest number of innovations is observed in children of different ages in the categories of emotions “disgust” and “joy” and the smallest differences in the levels of “surprise”, “contempt”, “sadness”. Students in the 5th grade (middle school age) most accurately categorize such emotions as “disgust”, “sadness”, “anger” and “joy”, less accurate categorization was carried out by children in relation to such emotions as “surprise”, “contempt”, “fear”, the least accurate categorization was categorized confidence “calmness”.

General Information

Keywords: categorization of perception, basic emotions, “perceptual event”

Journal rubric: Face Science

Article type: scientific article

DOI: https://doi.org/10.17759/exppsy.2025180405

Funding. The study was supported by the Russian Science Foundation, project number 25-18-00885.

Received 10.09.2025

Revised 24.11.2025

Accepted

Published

For citation: Baratova, D.M., Khoze, E.G., Anikina, V.G. (2025). Categorization of dynamic expressions of basic emotions in children of primary and secondary school age. Experimental Psychology (Russia), 18(4), 80–101. (In Russ.). https://doi.org/10.17759/exppsy.2025180405

© Baratova D.M., Khoze E.G., Anikina V.G., 2025

License: CC BY-NC 4.0

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Information About the Authors

Dina M. Baratova, Postgraduate Student, Institute of Experimental Psychology, Moscow State University of psychology and educat, Moscow, Russian Federation, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0005-5467-5796, e-mail: dinabaratova624@gmail.com

Evgeny G. Khoze, Candidate of Science (Psychology), Senior Researcher, Institute of Experimental Psychology, Moscow State University of Psychology and Education, Head of the Laboratory of Experimental and Practical Psychology,Associate Professor, Department of General Psychology,Moscow Institute of Psychoanalysis, Moscow, Russian Federation, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9355-1693, e-mail: house.yu@gmail.com

Veronika G. Anikina, Candidate of Science (Psychology), Associate Professor, Chair of General Psychology, Institute of Experimental Psychology, Moscow State University of Psychology and Education, Moscow, Russian Federation, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7987-6595, e-mail: vegav577@mail.ru

Contribution of the authors

Evgeny G. Khoze   — study concept; study planning; study supervision; manuscript writing.

Dina M. Baratova — data collection and analysis, application of statistical methods for data analysis; conducting the empirical study; manuscript writing.

Veronika G. Anikina — statistical data analysis, manuscript writing and formatting.

All authors participated in the discussion of the results and approved the final manuscript.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Ethics statement

The participants’ legal representatives provided written informed consent for participation in this study.

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