Neural responses to peers' emotional faces and voices in adolescence

Our research suggests that there are age-related changes in neural response to emotional faces and voices, in regions and networks involved in the processing of social information. We also investigate how the neural representation of these socio-emotional cues may differ in youth with chronic health conditions that are associated with social cognitive deficits, such as epilepsy.

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  • Morningstar, M., & Burns, J.A. (2025). Probing puberty as a source of developmental change in neural response to emotional faces in early adolescence. Developmental Psychobiology, 67(2), e70037. doi: 10.1002/dev.70037

  • Morningstar, M., Billetdeaux, K.A., Mattson, W.I., Gilbert, A.C., Nelson, E.E., & Hoskinson, K.R. (2024). Neural response to vocal emotional intensity in youth. Cognitive, Affective, and Behavioral Neuroscience, 25, 454-470. doi: 10.3758/s13415-024-01224-6

  • Morningstar, M., Hughes, C., French, R.C., Grannis, C., Mattson, W.I., & Nelson, E.E. (2024). Functional connectivity during facial and vocal emotion recognition: Preliminary evidence for dissociations in developmental change by nonverbal modality. Neuropsychologia, 202, 108946. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2024.108946

  • Morningstar, M., Mattson, W.I., & Nelson, E.E. (2022). Longitudinal change in neural response to vocal emotion in adolescence. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 17(10), 890-903. doi: 10.1093/scan/nsac021

  • Morningstar, M., Mattson, W.I., Singer, Jr., S., Venticinque, J., & Nelson, E.E. (2020). Children and adolescents’ neural response to emotional faces and voices: Age-related changes in common regions of activation. Social Neuroscience. doi: 10.1080/17470919.2020.1832572

  • Morningstar, M., Grannis, C., Mattson, W.I., & Nelson, E.E. (2019). Associations between adolescents’ social re-orientation towards peers over caregivers and neural response to teenage faces. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 13(108). doi: 10.3389/fnbeh.2019.00108

  • Morningstar, M., Mattson, W.I., Venticinque, J., Singer, Jr., S., Selvaraj, B., Hu, H.H., & Nelson, E.E. (2019). Age-related differences in neural activation and functional connectivity during the processing of vocal prosody in adolescence. Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience. doi: 10.3758/s13415-019-00742-y

  • Morningstar, M., Grannis, C., Mattson, W.I., & Nelson, E.E. (2022). Functional patterns of neural activation during vocal emotion recognition in youth with and without refractory epilepsy. NeuroImage: Clinical, 34, 102966. doi: 10.1016/j.nicl.2022.102966

  • Morningstar, M., French, R.C., Mattson, W.I., Englot, D.J., & Nelson, E.E. (2021). Social brain networks: Resting-state and task-based connectivity in youth with and without epilepsy. Neuropsychologia, 157, 107882. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2021.107882

  • Morningstar, M., Hung, A., Grannis, C., French, R.C., Mattson, W.I., Ostendorf, A.P., Gedela, S., Englot, D.J., & Nelson, E.E. (2020). Blunted neural response to emotional faces in the fusiform and superior temporal gyrus may be marker of emotion recognition deficits in youth with epilepsy. Epilepsy & Behavior, 112, 107432. doi: 10.1016/j.yebeh.2020.107432

  • Morningstar, M., Hung, A., Mattson, W.I., Gedela, S., Ostendorf, A.P., & Nelson, E.E. (2020). Internalizing symptoms in intractable pediatric epilepsy: Structural and functional brain correlates. Epilepsy & Behavior, 103, 1-11. doi: 10.1016/j.yebeh.2019.106845

Factors influencing the production of nonverbal emotional expressions

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We are investigating individual differences in nonverbal emotional expression patterns. For example, we examine how age, social experiences, or variations in psychological well-being can impact the nonverbal cues we use to convey emotional intent to others.

  • Morningstar, M., Nault, D.R., Lundell-Creagh, R., & daSilva, E.B. (In press). Expresser effects in research on emotion communication: Expanding our understanding of inter-individual differences in nonverbal expression of emotion. Affective Science.

  • Nault, D.R., Bonar, R.J.T., Ilyaz, E., Dirks, M.A., & Morningstar, M. (2024). Fast and friendly: The role of vocal cues in adolescents’ responses to and perceptions of peer provocation. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 34, 1054-1068. doi: 10.1111/jora.12992

  • Ilyaz, E., Feng, X., Fu, X., Nelson, E.E., & Morningstar, M. (2024). Vocal emotional expressions in mothers with and without a history of major depressive disorder. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 48, 513-537. doi: 10.1007/s10919-024-00462-z

  • Morningstar, M., Dirks, M.A., & Huang, S. (2017). Vocal Cues Underlying Youth and Adult Portrayals of Socio-Emotional Expressions. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 41(2), 155-183. doi: 10.1007/s10919-017-0250-7

  • Morningstar, M., Garcia, D., Dirks, M.A., & Bagner, D.M. (2019). Changes in parental prosody mediate effect of parent-training intervention on child language outcomes. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 87(3), 313-318. doi: 10.1037/ccp0000375

Associations between emotion recognition and psychosocial outcomes in youth

Our work has highlighted the association between the capacity to decode others’ nonverbal emotional cues and indices of psychosocial functioning in adolescents.

  • Nault, P., & Morningstar, M. (2025). Hostile attribution biases and evaluation of responses to peer provocation in early adolescents. Social Development, 34, e12813. doi: 10.1111/sode.12813

  • Davis, S.K., Morningstar, M., & Qualter, P. (2020). Ability EI predicts recognition of dynamic facial emotions, but not beyond the effects of crystallized IQ. Personality and Individual Differences. doi: 10.1016/j.paid.2020.109968

  • Davis, S.K., Morningstar, M., Dirks, M.A., & Qualter, P. (2020). Ability emotional intelligence: What about recognition of emotion in voices? Personality and Individual Differences, 160, 109938. doi: 10.1016/j.paid.2020.109938

  • Morningstar, M., Dirks, M.A., Rappaport, B.I., Pine, D.S., & Nelson, E.E. (2019; ePub 2017). Associations between anxious and depressive symptoms and the recognition of vocal socio-emotional expressions in youth. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 48(3), 491-500. doi: 10.1080/15374416.2017.1350963

  • Morningstar, M., Nowland, R., Dirks, M.A., & Qualter, P. (2019). Loneliness and the recognition of vocal socio-emotional expressions in adolescence. Cognition & Emotion. doi: 10.1080/02699931.2019.1682971

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Development of emotion recognition skills in adolescence

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How does our interpretation of emotional nonverbal cues change with age? Our research has shown that the capacity to interpret expressions of emotion continues to develop throughout adolescence, particularly when it comes to vocal prosody. We have also investigated how variations in emotional intensity might impact emotion recognition.

  • Morningstar, M., Nelson, E.E., & Dirks, M.A. (2018). Maturation of vocal emotion recognition: Insights from the developmental and neuroimaging literature. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 90, 221-230. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2018.04.019

  • Morningstar, M., Ly, V.Y., Feldman, L., & Dirks, M.A. (2018). Mid-Adolescents’ and Adults’ Recognition of Vocal Cues of Emotion and Social Intent: Differences by Expression and Speaker Age. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 42(2), 237-251. doi: 10.1007/s10919-018-0274-7

  • Morningstar, M., Venticinque, J., & Nelson, E.E. (2018). Differences in adult and adolescent listeners’ ratings of valence and arousal in emotional prosody. Cognition & Emotion. doi: 10.1080/02699931.2018.1561422

  • Morningstar, M., Gilbert, A.C., Burdo, J., Leis, M., & Dirks, M.A. (2021). Recognition of vocal socio-emotional expressions at varying levels of emotional intensity. Emotion, 21(7), 1570-1575. doi: 10.1037/emo0001024

  • Woodard, K., Plate, R.C., Morningstar, M., Wood, A., & Pollak, S.D. (2021). Categorization of vocal emotion cues depends on distributions of input. Affective Science, 2, 301-310. doi: 10.1007/s42761-021-00038-w