Is there any difference between sexes in recognizing emotions in adolescence?

Abstract

Recognizing emotions in faces refers to the ability to identify, discriminate, and analyze emotional states through facial expressions, which is of paramount importance for social interaction. Throughout human development, there are qualitative and quantitative changes in this ability, including differences in how the sexes perform this task. The objective of this systematic review was to evaluate empirical research published in the last ten years that investigated the development of the ability to recognize basic emotions in faces during adolescence. The analysis of the selected articles revealed a female advantage in recognizing emotions in faces in adolescence, which seems related to neurobiological, psychosocial, and cultural factors that affect the development of boys and girls differently.