Do Emotions Speak a Universal Language? English‐Speaking Preschoolers' and Adults' Detection of Emotional Prosody in an Unfamiliar Language

ABSTRACT We examined English‐speaking preschoolers' and adults' attention to emotional prosody in an unfamiliar language when asked to: (a) match emotional prosody with emotional faces; and (b) use emotional prosody to identify a speaker's intended referent. In Experiment 1, 4‐year‐olds ( N = 36, M = 4.16 years; 18 females) and adults ( N = 38, M = 21.18 years; 26 females) matched happy and sad Polish utterances to a corresponding emotional face, as evidenced through pointing decisions. In Experiment 2, adults ( N = 36, M = 20.17 years; 31 females), but not 4‐year‐olds ( N = 36, M = 4.11 years; 18 females), matched the same emotional utterances to objects whose properties signalled an association with happiness or sadness (e.g., intact vs. broken toy). These findings demonstrate that 4‐year‐olds and adults can recognise emotional prosody in an unfamiliar language, however, only adults are successful at extending this information to other kinds of emotion‐relevant decisions.