Emotional prosody perception in Mandarin: Effects of age, hearing, education, and cognition.

Accurately recognizing the emotional prosody of others is crucial for effective social interactions, yet this ability notably declines as individuals age, particularly in individuals with age-related hearing loss. To further understand how aging and hearing loss affect older adults' recognition patterns and to investigate potential contributors, the present study recruited 32 older adults with normal hearing, 26 older adults with age-related hearing loss, 30 younger adults with simulated hearing loss, and 30 younger adults with normal hearing to identify vocal emotions portrayed in semantically neutral Chinese words. Accuracy was analyzed using generalized linear mixed-effects models to assess the impact of aging and hearing loss. Multiple linear regression explored the contributions of age, low- and high-frequency hearing sensitivity, cognitive scores, and education level. The influence of Mandarin lexical tones on emotional prosody perception was also investigated. Results showed older adults with hearing loss had the lowest accuracy, followed by older adults with normal hearing. Younger adults with simulated hearing loss outperformed both older groups but lagged behind younger adults with normal hearing. Happiness and fear were particularly challenging emotions for individuals with hearing loss. Flat and rising tones enhanced happiness recognition, while falling tones improved sadness recognition. High-frequency hearing loss, cognitive scores, and years of education are significant contributors to older adults' performance. These findings reveal that older age and hearing loss are associated with reduced sensitivity to emotional prosody. Furthermore, the pattern of emotional prosody perception appears to differ across emotions and is related to individual differences in sensory, cognitive, and social factors. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).