'Inside Out 2' adds the new emotion Anxiety. Why that's important for kids.

Inside Out 2 deals with big feelings — and that's a good thing, according to one child development expert.

The Disney Pixar film, out June 14, introduces five new emotions, including Anxiety, the orange frizzy-headed ball of nervousness with a goofy grin. The new character, voiced by Maya Hawke, arrives as Riley is now a teenager in the midst of puberty and dealing with more complex emotions beyond the original five: Joy (Amy Poehler), Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Anger (Lewis Black), Fear (Tony Hale, taking over for Bill Hader) and Disgust (Liza Lapira, taking over for Mindy Kaling).

Anxiety shakes up Headquarters with other boat-rocking newbies — Envy (Ayo Edebiri), Ennui (Adèle Exarchopoulos), Embarrassment (Paul Walter Hauser) and Nostalgia (June Squibb) — but is clearly the scene-stealer.

Director Kelsey Mann told Empire magazine he was "especially excited about Anxiety. There are a lot of different types of anxiety, but we’re really leaning into social anxiety, wanting to fit in and be part of a group. Wondering ‘Am I good enough?’ kids have a much deeper language of their emotions than I did as a kid. ... I think that’s fantastic. We need to be talking about it more. I’m hoping with this film we’re really able to open up the conversation.”

‘It embodies kids’ lived experience’

That's what psychologist Eileen Kennedy-Moore hopes as well. A fan of the 2015 original film for its way of giving kids a clever, vivid way to understand emotions, she's excited to see Anxiety join the mix.

"I thought it was hilarious that she was carrying a lot of baggage" as Anxiety is introduced in the film, says the author of Growing Feelings: A Kids' Guide to Dealing With Emotions About Friends and Other Kids. "I suspect this is going to be a movie that adults enjoy at a different level than kids. There will be humor for us, as well as for the kids."

Seeing frazzled Anxiety in animated form on the big screen will help children better understand the feelings — of tension and worried thoughts — that can be longer lasting.

“I think it embodies kids’ lived experience, which is wonderful,” says Kennedy-Moore, adding that 80% of patients in her practice are in treatment for anxiety. (According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 9.4% of U.S. children, about 5.8 million, have been diagnosed with anxiety. While temporary and mild anxiety are common, for some it can be intense enough to interfere with one’s ability to function in daily life.)

There's a developmental sequence in which children experience and understand emotions, she says. For instance, the average 2-year-old can only categorize facial expressions as happy or angry. As they grow, they start to be able to differentiate an angry face from other negative emotions. Between ages 7 and 10, the speed in which they can label emotions and identify less intense feelings improves noticeably. So it makes sense developmentally that as Riley gets older, and is now 13, her feelings are more complex.

“The first film covered five basic emotions, but the beauty of human beings is that our experiences are so layered and nuanced,” says Kennedy-Moore, who hopes the self-conscious emotions like guilt, pride, shame and jealousy are woven in as well as they are also age-appropriate. “These are the emotions that kids get as they grow older.”

She also hopes the film demonstrates what she tries to teach her patients: That “feelings are not a thing to be gotten rid of.” Instead, they "are a source of information about ourselves, and what's going on around us. So we want to try to understand that and then make choices about how we view it and how we respond to it. An analogy that I use with kids is: Feelings are kind of like smells. They can be mild or intense, pleasant or unpleasant, but they’re never dangerous.”

She’s optimistic that Inside Out 2 will further the conversation about emotion to a wide audience, as the first was the sixth-highest-grossing Pixar film of all time.

“I was a big fan of the previous movie,” she said. “And I think children are hungry for this kind of information. Kids can have these conversations. They can understand their emotional lives. They want to.”

'We can all relate,' says 'Inside Out' director

Mann said he "zeroed in on the idea of Anxiety being a major character" early.

“It’s something that really starts to appear as we become teenagers — we can all relate," he told MovieFone. "I remember doing a lot of research early on about what happens in our brains at this age that triggered this idea of a wrecking ball coming through Headquarters — a bunch of workers piling in and tearing everything down. It’s a renovation — that’s kind of what it feels like to be a teenager. It’s chaotic."

Hawke, who plays Anxiety, said she channeled her own anxiety for the role.

"The little voice that I hear in my own head that tells me to worry if my shoes are wrong or ... I'm going to say something stupid — I just tapped into that and let it come out of my mouth instead of holding it in like I usually do," she told the Hollywood Reporter.

Poehler, who plays the blue-haired but perennially cheery Joy, told Yahoo U.K. that the beauty of these Pixar films is taking a "high concept" and pairing it with a "visual landscape" that helps people "communicate better and talk about stuff."

"In the first [film], they managed to find a way to remind us that it's OK to sit with sadness and just stay there, which is such a beautiful idea," she said. "In the second one, Anxiety shows up and gets everyone all bothered." But "the way in which Anxiety is enlisting other people to worry is super funny and so smart."

"So I think it's going to be another version of that," she adds. "You're going to be able to talk to your younger self or your young kids about what anxiety does when it's left unchecked and in a funny, interesting, visual way."

Inside Out 2 is in theaters on June 14.

Updated, June 12, 2024, 2 p.m. ET: This story has been updated to reflect new details about Inside Out 2.