ArticleFrontiers in psychology2021
Masking Emotions: Face Masks Impair How We Read Emotions.
Article in Frontiers in psychology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 67 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
67 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Child mask mandates for COVID-19: a systematic review.Archives of disease in childhood · 2024Pooled it
- [Impact of wearing face masks in public to prevent infectious diseases on the psychosocial development in children and adolescents: a systematic review].Bundesgesundheitsblatt, Gesundheitsforschung, Gesundheitsschutz · 2021Pooled it
- Incomplete Faces Do but Masked Faces Do Not Affect Mind Perception.Psychological reports · 2026Article
- Individual gaze preferences and attentional cues interact in masked and unmasked face recognition.Attention, perception & psychophysics · 2026Article
- Longitudinal effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on infant and toddler development: a retrospective cohort study.BMJ paediatrics open · 2026Article
- Application of a parametric supermatrix multi-task multimodal deep learning model based on electroencephalogram and peripheral physiological signal fusion in emotion recognition.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2026Article
- Visual exposure to masked faces benefits personally familiar but not famous face recognition.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Risks and benefits of face masks in children.Frontiers in pediatrics · 2026Review
- The application of improved AFCNN model for children's psychological emotion recognition.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Limited Effect of Masking During COVID-19 Pandemic on ADOS-2 Algorithm Scores in Toddlers With and Without Autism.Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research · 2025Article
- Article
- Unintended consequences of measures implemented in the school setting to contain the COVID-19 pandemic: a scoping review.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2024Article
- Three years of COVID-19-related school restrictions and mental health of children and adolescents in Japan.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Review
- Accuracy and Speed of Emotion Recognition With Face Masks.Europe's journal of psychology · 2024Article
- Mask use in Chinese children admitted to the outpatient department: a single-center cross-sectional study.Environmental health and preventive medicine · 2024Article
- Lesson learned from the COVID-19 pandemic: toddlers learn earlier to read emotions with face masks.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
- Masked emotions: does children's affective state influence emotion recognition?Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
- Article
- Article
7 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
To date, COVID-19 has spread across the world, changing our way of life and forcing us to wear face masks. This report demonstrates that face masks influence the human ability to infer emotions by observing facial configurations. Specifically, a mask obstructing a face limits the ability of people of all ages to infer emotions expressed by facial features, but the difficulties associated with the mask's use are significantly pronounced in children aged between 3 and 5 years old. These findings are of essential importance, as they suggest that we live in a time that may potentially affect the development of social and emotion reasoning, and young children's future social abilities should be monitored to assess the true impact of the use of masks.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.