2 experiments were conducted to examine 7-month-old infants' perception of the facial expressions happy and fear. Using a paired-comparison procedure, infants in the first experiment were able to generalize their discrimination of these 2 expressions across the faces of 4 male and female models if they were first presented with the set of happy faces, but not if they were first presented with the set of fear faces. A second experiment was conducted to examine the source of the stimulus presentation order effect. Here a second group of 7-month-old infants was presented with a single male or female face posing both the happy and fear expressions simultaneously. The results revealed significantly longer looking to the fear face. This preference to look at fear faces is discussed, as are its implications for studies of expression recognition in general.

2 experiments were conducted to examine 7-month-old infants' perception of the facial expressions happy and fear. Using a paired-comparison procedure, infants in the first experiment were able to generalize their discrimination of these 2 expressions across the faces of 4 male and female models if they were first presented with the set of happy faces, but not if they were first presented with the set of fear faces. A second experiment was conducted to examine the source of the stimulus presentation order effect. Here a second group of 7-month-old infants was presented with a single male or female face posing both the happy and fear expressions simultaneously. The results revealed significantly longer looking to the fear face. This preference to look at fear faces is discussed, as are its implications for studies of expression recognition in general.

The purpose of this study was to determine the age at which children begin to recognise the affective qualities in sung and instrumentally-presented melodies. Four, seven, and nine-year-old children who had been pretested for comprehension of emotional concepts listened to melodies that had been rated by adults as either (1) happy, (2) sad, (3) angry, or (4) frightened- sounding. The melodies were presented in two modalities: soprano voice singing nonsense syllables, and viola. Overall volume levels were held constant, although many other features were varied. The data indicated that thete are age changes in this ability, that modality does in some instances play a role in emotional comprehension, and that some of the emotions are easier to interpret than others. There are also interaction effects among the factors.

This study examines middle‐aged parents' disclosure about their own lives and current concerns, with their late‐adolescent children. Three hundred seventy‐two parents of college freshmen, averaging 47 years of age, participated by filling out an anonymous questionnaire that asked about 28 topics, varying in intimacy, of concern to adults. The subjects indicated whether they had discussed each topic with their child, and, if they had, the motivations that prompted them to do so. The data revealed that mothers disclosed more than did fathers, and they were more likely to cite “venting,”“asking advice,” and “seeking emotional support” as reasons for disclosure; fathers were more likely to cite “trying to change his/her behavior” as a rationale for disclosure. Child's gender did not affect disclosure rates, but sons and daughters were disclosed to for different reasons. Divorced parents disclosed more than did parents from continuously intact families, and they cited somewhat different reasons for disclosure.

The disclosure of 227 7th‐ through 12th‐grade adolescents to four other persons – their closest same‐ and cross‐sex best friends, and lesser‐but‐good same‐ and cross‐sex friends – about 40 topics varying widely in intimacy was examined; in addition, each subject rated every topic's intimacy. A (2) gender × (2) friend's gender × (2) closeness × (3) age × (3) intimacy level ANOVA yielded two large main effects (partial ω2 > .15), closeness and topic intimacy. Three large interaction effects – gender by friend's gender, friend's gender by intimacy, and gender by closeness by intimacy – were also found, as was a moderate‐sized closeness by gender by friend's gender interaction (partial co2= .08). A number of other effects were statistically significant but of only small magnitude. The perceived intimacy of 6 of the studied topics varied across age groups, and one topic, “your weight” was rated differently by males and females. The data are discussed in relation to previous research on adolescent gender differences in friendship and disclosure.

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