We found much to admire in Vigil's target article. The novel constructs that he introduced to explain sex differences in emotion expression seem likely to become topics for further research, particularly among social psychologists. We also found some points that seemed underdeveloped or misleading.
1. Functions of emotion expression
In considering the functions of emotion-expressive behavior, Vigil focused on a rather narrow, though significant, area. He proposed that emotion expressions evolved to promote attraction and aversion in different types of relationships. He then operationally defined emotions as expressive behaviors – a highly restrictive view of emotions and their various properties. Though we see expression as an important aspect of emotion, it is but one of its components. Furthermore, expressions can and do occur without a matching experiential or feeling component, and the latter is widely considered as the motivational aspect of emotion (LeDoux, in press). In responding to a survey on the definition, functions, activation, and regulation of emotion, 35 distinguished emotion scientists identified social communication as one of six functions of emotion (Izard Reference Izard2008).
2. First-order or second-order emotions
Vigil's allusion to socio-relational expressive behavior as reflecting basic or first-order emotions could prove misleading. The expressions that he describes as conveying reciprocity potential and trustworthiness are clearly higher-order emotions or emotion schemas that include complex cognitive content (Izard Reference Izard2009). The latter undoubtedly reflects the cultural context of the individuals engaged in exchanging expressive-behavior signals. In the target article, Vigil shows little concern for the roles of cultural and epigenetic factors in shaping emotion-expressive behavior.
3. Epigenetic, cultural, and personality factors influence emotion expression
Memes are one of several epigenetic mechanisms that may influence the development and transmission of expressive behavior. Natural selection can act on “replicant” units (memes) that consist of cognition and action patterns. Experts on evolution hypothesize that memes emerged to serve unique adaptive functions in social interactions that are transmitted through imitative learning (Dawkins 1976/1989). Even newborns can imitate simple facial behavior (Meltzoff & Moore Reference Meltzoff and Moore1994), and they display identifiable discrete emotion expressions later in infancy (Izard et al. Reference Izard, Fantauzzo, Castle, Haynes, Rayias and Putnam1995). In the preschool years, make-believe play further enhances children's imitative skills. Clearly, both ontogenetic development and the evolutionary processes in phylogeny play significant roles in emotion expressive behavior (Izard Reference Izard2009; Noble Reference Noble2006).
People express emotions for reasons other than promoting interpersonal attraction and aversion, and emotion responding is always influenced by temperament/personality. One can express interest and engagement in a wide variety of nonsocial events or situations (Izard Reference Izard2007; Silvia Reference Silvia2006). A person may become frustrated or angry when her computer malfunctions, frightened by a strange noise after a storm causes a power failure, and disgusted by foul tastes or odors. The same is true for experiencing and expressing other emotions (Izard Reference Izard1991).
4. Sex differences in emotion experiences and expressions
Vigil maintains that females are better at detecting and identifying emotions in the expressions of others. Though research results on this issue consistently favor females, the size of the difference is typically quite small (McClure Reference McClure2000). Moreover, Vigil claims that females are more expressive than males. There is little, if any, evidence to show that these differences are determined more by evolution than by culture and socialization. On the contrary, findings based on large data-sets relating to 3- to 5-year-old children typically show age differences but not sex differences in emotion knowledge – the understanding of the expressions, feelings, and functions of emotions (Finlon et al. Reference Finlon, Grossman and Izard2009). We have found no evidence that girls are more expressive than boys. Our data show no consistent sex differences in emotion expressions during unstructured playtime (as indexed by independent observers' coding of facial cues, vocal cues, and body posture with our Emotion Behavior Coding System). In the one data set where we found sex differences, boys showed more expressiveness than girls, especially more happy expressions, but this difference was not consistent across cohorts.
Our data do support Vigil's claim that anger and joy should share trait impressions and overlapping characteristics. In 3- to 5-year-old children, during unstructured playtime, we found both increased anger and increased joy expression related to more positive interactions with peers and teachers and less solitary behaviors. We also found that increased sadness and increased anger were related to more negative interactions with peers and teachers. Contrary to Vigil's claims, there were no sex differences in these emotion expression-behavior relations.
The findings from our data sets are from low-socioeconomic status (SES), urban, minority populations. We suspect that most of the data reviewed in the target article came from middle-class Caucasian participants. Our data from children in low-income families help account for some significant differences related to ethnicity (Krauthamer-Ewing Reference Krauthamer-Ewing2009), but not those determined primarily by evolutionary processes.
Vigil noted that Latino Americans, as a collectivistic culture, report more sadness-related behaviors than those from individualistic cultures. This finding is also contrary to what we have observed. In 3- to 5-year-old Hispanic and African American children, we found no differences in sadness expressions in the classroom, and African American mothers in our samples scored higher than Hispanic mothers on a depression inventory (although this finding was likely influenced by other demographic factors; Krauthamer-Ewing Reference Krauthamer-Ewing2009).
5. Conclusion
In sum, we think that our finding of no consistent emotion-expression sex differences in several cohorts of Black and Hispanic 3- to 5-year-old children raises serious questions relating to Vigil's theory. In particular, our data suggest that Vigil may have gone too far in discounting familial (e.g., parental socialization of emotions), other social, and cultural factors in making an unjustifiably strong claim that evolution is the primary determinant of sex differences in the expression of emotions. Though we disagree with Vigil on this particular issue, we have long supported theories that view evolutionary processes as critical to understanding emotions and emotion processes (Izard Reference Izard2009).
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This work was supported by grant R01MH080909 from the National Institute of Mental Health. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institute of Mental Health or the National Institutes of Health.
