It has been a few months now since face masks have been employed as a health control measure to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Some of us were a little slower to get into the habit, understandably forgetting our masks in our cars (or worse, at home), while others quickly got on board and adjusted to the new rules and regulations. But how are we really adjusting?
Are masks affecting our emotional development and ability to pick up on social cues?
In the time since we’ve been forced to wear face coverings, have you had a conversation with someone at work and wondered what they were honestly thinking or feeling? Have you worried over the potential impact face coverings have on your child’s social and emotional development? While the ability to pick up on emotions will vary from person to person, research suggests we may be understanding others better than we think. Think back to your work colleague for a moment. You may have doubted your ability to be entirely receptive of their mood, but you can probably recall if they were smiling, so why is that? Well, despite masks covering the majority of our faces, our eyes remain exposed. Studies show that eyes are critical emotional cues and that people who look at the eyes to determine whether a smile is real or fake, are correct more often than those who rely on the mouth.
So, what about the emotional development of children?
No evidence proves children cannot recognize faces or emotions despite facial coverings. They are just as capable as using the eyes as emotional cues, along with auditory communication to pick up emotional information. When it comes to audio-only listeners, studies show that they can better detect when someone is lying. When we employ audio-only communication, we are better at judging the emotions of others. Like the eyes, the voice is also a key player in decoding emotions and maybe even more reliable than the face.
The scientific belief that babies learn facial expressions from their parents was debunked by studies of blind children that showed they produce similar facial expressions to sighted children. This suggests that emotional development is not as dependent upon facial expressions as we might think.
Could this help us more than hinder us?
So when we consider that those who only look at the eyes see more truth, and those who can only listen, hear more truth, then wearing a mask or interacting with someone with a mask is almost like losing one sense and gaining heightened abilities in another. And if that is the case, one might suggest that a mask may improve our ability to adapt and read other social and emotional cues. In either case, there are many ways to convey emotions whether or not someone is looking at our face. While there is no long-term data on the effect masks have on emotional development, a study like this would take time to, well, develop. Despite our curiosities, most of us might be ready to look at each other’s faces in the future, rather than long-term data on masks.
References
Valente, D., Theurel, A., & Gentaz, E. (2017). The role of visual experience in the production of emotional facial expressions by blind people: a review. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 25(2), 483–497. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-017-1338-0
Martins, A. T., Faísca, L., Vieira, H., & Gonçalves, G. (2019). Emotional Recognition and Empathy both in Deaf and Blind Adults. The Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, 24(2), 119–127. https://doi.org/10.1093/deafed/eny046
Wiseman, R. (1995). The megalab truth test. Nature, 373(6513), 391–391. https://doi.org/10.1038/373391a0
Kraus, M. W. (2017). Voice-only communication enhances empathic accuracy. American Psychologist, 72(7), 644–654. https://doi.org/10.1037/amp0000147
Kret, M. E., & de Gelder, B. (2012). Islamic Headdress Influences How Emotion is Recognized from the Eyes. Frontiers in Psychology, 3. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00110
Mai, X., Ge, Y., Tao, L., Tang, H., Liu, C., & Luo, Y.-J. (2011). Eyes Are Windows to the Chinese Soul: Evidence from the Detection of Real and Fake Smiles. PLoS ONE, 6(5), e19903. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0019903