Little kids can likely read your emotions even when you wear a face mask, study finds

A study of over 300 children ages 3 to 6 found that they can determine a person's emotions, even while they were wearing a face mask.

There has been some concern that the face masks used at school during the pandemic may be hurting younger children's development, but this research letter published in JAMA Pediatrics suggests that kids recognize emotions about as well as they could without masks.

For this study, researchers from University Hospital Lausanne in Switzerland showed 90 pictures at random to nearly 300 children ages 3 to 6. The photos showed actors who expressed joy, anger or sadness. In half of the images, actors wore masks.