Conceptual Knowledge of Emotions is Semantically Shared and Socially Informative

Friendships are a critical source of social connection throughout the lifespan, especially for university students. Using longitudinal social network surveys (N = 988 friendship ratings) and self-reported perceptions of social status over time, we investigated whether objective and subjective measures of social connectivity were associated with semantic representations of emotion concepts, such as happiness and disgust, in a sample of first-year university students (N = 38, mean age = 18.13 years). We found that semantic representations of basic emotions were highly similar, and that individuals who represent emotions more normatively are more accurate about their friendships in the social network. Those that were more accurate about their own friendships were also more accurate about others’ friendships and viewed themselves as having higher social status over time. Thus, emotion representational similarity may play an important role in social networks that impact social connection during this important transition period in early adulthood.