Let A be a unital, complex normed *-algebra with the identity element e such that the set of all algebraic elements of A is norm dense in the set of all self-adjoint elements of A and let {Dn} ∞ n=0 and {∆n} ∞ n=0 be sequences of continuous linear mappings on A satisfying Dn+1(p) = ∑ n k=0 D n−k (p)D k (p), ∆n+1(p) = ∑ n k=0 ∆ n−k (p)D k (p), for all projections p of A and all nonnegative integers n. Moreover, suppose that D0(p) = D0(p) 2 holds for all projections p of A. Then ∆n = Cn 2 (R D 0 (e) ∆0 + L ∆ 0 (e) D0) for all n ∈ N , where Cn denotes the n th Catalan number and R D 0 (e) (a) = aD0(e) and L ∆ 0 (e) (a) = ∆0(e)a for all a ∈ A. Using this result, we present a characterization of left τ-centralizers satisfying a certain recursive relation. In addition, a characterization of generalized higher derivations is presented. Moreover, we show that higher derivations, prime higher derivations, left higher derivations, and σ-derivations are zero under certain conditions.