Identifying emotions and feelings: exploratory study with elementary and high school students

Objective: To assess the competence of students from Grade 5 to 10 of elementary and high school to identify and differentiate emotions and feelings. Methods: This was cross-sectional, exploratory study, carried out during the Project "MaiSaudeMental" (More Mental Health), at the referall CENTRO-01-0145-FEDER-023293, and developed in Escola Superior de Satide of Institute Politecnico de Viseu, Portugal. This was a convenience sample including 101 children/adolescents. A questionnaire for sociodemographic characterization and an Inventory to Identify Emotions and Feelings were used. This self-reporting inventory evaluated the capacity of children/adolescents to identify and differentiate their emotions and feelings, based on everyday situations. The questionnaire was composed of 15 items that correspond to 15 situations. The questionnaire was applied in the classroom, after a short explanation on how it worked and clarification to questions of participants. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (R) (SPSS version 24.0) was used for data process, and a descriptive and analytical assessment was performed. The 95% confidence interval for the tests analysis was considered significant (p<0.05). Results: The students were aged between 9 and 15 years old, and the majority (27.7%) was attending grade 8. In general, students identified few emotions and feelings, a mean score of 13.36 points for a maximum score of 39 of emotion identification, whereas on average they identify more positive emotions and feelings (5.11 points) than negative (4.33 points) or neutral (3.91 points). In all dimensions, mean values were higher in female students and in 14-year-old students, but slightly significant for some emotion differentiations (p<0.05). Conclusion: The results found corroborate with investigations in this area. Children and adolescents have poor capacity to identify and differentiate emotions, although they show greater capacity to differentiate positive emotions rather than negative or neutral emotions. We also observed that female students have more competence to differentiate and identify emotions, and these competences increase with age.