The adaptation and validation of the Emotion Matching Task for preschool children in Spain

The Emotion Matching Task (EMT; Izard, Haskins, Schultz, Trentacosta, & King, 2003) was developed to assess emotion knowledge in preschoolers and was demonstrated to show adequate convergent and predictive validity in an American sample (Morgan, Izard, & King, 2010). In light of the need for valid measures for assessing emotion knowledge in Spanish-speaking children, we adapted the EMT for preschoolers in Spain and conducted a psychometric validation with 110 Spanish children, aged 3 to 6. The EMT Spanish version showed good internal consistency and demonstrated expected concurrent validity with externalizing problems and adaptive abilities. Therefore the current study indicates that the adapted EMT is a valid tool to assess preschool children’s emotion knowledge in Spain.