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Cited by 366Child and Animal Learning DevelopmentEmotions and Moral BehaviorChild and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development

Emotion words, emotion concepts, and emotional development in children: A constructionist hypothesis

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Hoemann, Katie, Xu, Fei, Barrett, Lisa Feldman·2019·Developmental Psychology
DOI 10.1037/dev0000686PMC PMC6716622
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Abstract

In this article, we integrate two constructionist approaches-the theory of constructed emotion and rational constructivism-to introduce several novel hypotheses for understanding emotional development. We first discuss the hypothesis that emotion categories are abstract and conceptual, whose instances share a goal-based function in a particular context but are highly variable in their affective, physical, and perceptual features. Next, we discuss the possibility that emotional development is the process of developing emotion concepts, and that emotion words may be a critical part of this process. We hypothesize that infants and children learn emotion categories the way they learn other abstract conceptual categories-by observing others use the same emotion word to label highly variable events. Finally, we hypothesize that emotional development can be understood as a concept construction problem: a child becomes capable of experiencing and perceiving emotion only when her brain develops the capacity to assemble ad hoc, situated emotion concepts for the purposes of guiding behavior and giving meaning to sensory inputs. Specifically, we offer a predictive processing account of emotional development. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

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  • Supervised category learning such as word learning is an important source of emotional development and cultural inheritance.

    “Thus, 'supervised category learning' such as word learning is an important source of emotional development and cultural inheritance.58,141,157,158”

    From A new science of emotion: implications for functional neurological disorder (2022) · cites this paper as [58]

    In “A Constructionist Proposal for Emotional Development” (page unavailable), the authors propose that caregiver emotion words may guide children’s learning of emotion categories and their cultural inheritance. The claim presents this as an established source of development and calls it “supervised” learning, whereas the paper frames it as a hypothesis and says infants more often observe incidental uses of emotion words than receive explicit labels. (LLM, conf=0.84)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

  • When an experience of emotion is used as a reference for the present constructed category, a conceptual category for emotion is constructed.

    “When an experience of emotion is used as a reference for the present constructed category, we are constructing a conceptual category for emotion.58,143”

    From A new science of emotion: implications for functional neurological disorder (2022) · cites this paper as [58]

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Authors
Hoemann, K., Xu, F., & Barrett, L. F.
Affiliations
  • Northeastern University (US)
  • University of California, Berkeley (US)
ORCID
Venue
Developmental Psychology
Publisher
American Psychological Association (APA)
Published
2019-09
Volume
55
Issue
9
Pages
1830-1849
ISSN
  • 0012-1649 (ISSN-L)
  • 1939-0599
DOI
10.1037/dev0000686
PMC
PMC6716622
OpenAlex
W2970552953
Semantic Scholar
b9d84f0dcf85b3855a2e48100a7263d820986fed
Cited by
354
References
179
Citations by year
2026: 62 · 2025: 41 · 2024: 48 · 2023: 47 · 2022: 45 · 2021: 43 · 2020: 59 · 2019: 8 · 2013: 1
FWCI
70.57
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Developmental Psychology (publishedVersion, other-oa)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
  • Lirias (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences (W911NF-16-1-0191)
  • National Cancer Institute (U01 CA193632)
  • National Institute of Mental Health (R01 MH113234; R01 MH109464)
  • National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (1 F31 HL140943-01)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Emotions and Moral Behavior
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
Keywords
emotional development, emotion concepts, emotional words, constructionism, theory of constructed emotion, emotion categories, predictive processing, concept formation, infant language acquisition
MeSH terms
Social Learning, Child, Child Development, Child, Preschool, Concept Formation, Emotions, Humans, Infant, Psychological Theory

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