LOS ANGELES (KNX) — Young children can discern precisely how you feel and the emotions you express even while you’re wearing a mask, according to a study published this month in JAMA Pediatrics.
Researchers at Switzerland’s Lausanne University Hospital showed 300 children between 3 and 6-years-old pictures of facial expressions masked by facial coverings. The children matched the emotions to the images correctly most of the time, researchers said. And the older the child, the more likely they were to identify the correct feeling, the study said.
“Even with masks, small children can probably make rational inferences about the emotions of others,” developmental psychologist Ashley Luba, who did not participate in the research, told the California News-Times about the results.
“In language processing, it is important for children to learn to read their lips, but research reveals that masks do not impair their development,” Luba, who studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, continued. “The risk of getting COVID by not wearing a mask can outweigh the slight communication problems that a child may have.”
The study, authors concluded, showed there should be little concern about learning impairments caused by mask-wearing, public health mitigation strategies.
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