title: Emotion Knowledge and Attentional Differences in Preschoolers Showing Context-Inappropriate Anger.
abstract: Some children show anger inappropriate for the situation based on the predominant incentives, which is called context-inappropriate anger. Children need to attend to and interpret situational incentives for appropriate emotional responses. We examined associations of context-inappropriate anger with emotion recognition and attention problems in 43 preschoolers (42% male; M age = 55.1 months, SD = 4.1). Parents rated context-inappropriate anger across situations. Teachers rated attention problems using the Child Behavior Checklist-Teacher Report Form. Emotion recognition was ability to recognize emotional faces using the Emotion Matching Test. Anger perception bias was indicated by anger to non-anger situations using an adapted Affect Knowledge Test. 28% of children showed context-inappropriate anger, which correlated with lower emotion recognition (β = -.28) and higher attention problems (β = .36). Higher attention problems correlated with more anger perception bias (β = .32). This cross-sectional, correlational study provides preliminary findings that children with context-inappropriate anger showed more attention problems, which suggests that both "problems" tend to covary and associate with deficits or biases in emotion knowledge.
authors.affiliation: University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, USA rlocke@umassd.edu.
authors.forename: Robin L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Locke
authors.affiliation: University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, USA.
authors.forename: Nichole J
authors.initials: NJ
authors.lastname: Lang
mesh_terms: D000786:Anger / Q000502:physiology*; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D002652:Child Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005149:Facial Expression; D000066499:Facial Recognition / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D000066553:Problem Behavior
keywords: attention; context; emotion; preschool