Infant Physiological and Behavioral Responses to a Jealousy Provoking Condition

Abstract

Recent research has demonstrated a relationship between infants' tonic electroencephalogram (EEG) patterns and approach‐style jealousy responses (Mize & Jones, ). Although it has been found that adults exhibit approach‐style neural activity during jealousy paradigms (Harmon‐Jones, Peterson, and Harris, ), parallel research on neural activity during a jealousy paradigm in infants is lacking from the literature base. The purpose of the current research is to examine EEG patterns of 35 infants (Mean age = 8.92 months old) in a social‐rival paradigm designed to elicit jealousy responses. Consistent with past research, infants demonstrated more approach‐style, jealousy‐related behaviors when their mothers attended to a social‐rival than to a nonsocial rival. Additionally, infants demonstrated approach‐style anterior EEG activity during the social‐rival condition, a pattern that is associated with jealousy. The current findings suggest that the physiological underpinnings for the emotions that motivate the protection of important dyadic relationships are in place early in ontogeny. Therefore, jealousy‐type behaviors and physiological responses begin to be observable as early as 9‐months‐old when maternal attention is lost to a social‐rival.