Perception of pro- and antisocial behavior by children: modulations of EEG alpha and beta rhythms

Lilia Orekhova,Aleksandr Kulichenko,Vladimir Pavlenko,Anna Mikhailova,I.V Abakumova,E.V Vorobyova

doi:10.1051/shsconf/20197009007

Lilia Orekhova, Aleksandr Kulichenko + Show 4 more

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https://doi.org/10.1051/shsconf/20197009007

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Abstract

The paper surveys the behavior and psychophysiological responses (electroencephalographic power modulations of the alpha and beta rhythms) in 16 boys and 33 girls aged from 1.5 to 3.5 years when they were distributing reward tokens (carton cookies) among the toy characters who previously demonstrated proand antisocial behavior (rendering help and causing harm, respectively). The individual way of distributing the reward was translated into a moral evaluation index (MEI) for each child. When children were distributing the reward tokens, an increase in power, relative to the baseline, was registered for theta rhythm in the prefrontal, frontal and occipital cortex regions, and for beta rhythm in the temporal and occipital regions. Besides, those children who tended to give a bigger reward to the good-acting toy character (i.e., having higher MEI) showed a significantly greater increase in beta rhythm power compared to the children with lower MEI. The reason for that might be that children with higher MEI engage their cognitive resources into making socially significant decisions more effectively and adequately process emotionally significant information.

Highlights

The formation of moral behavior gets its start in the earliest months of a child’s life [1]
It was shown that, starting from the age of 18 months, children are already capable of discriminating between pro- and antisocial behaviors demonstrated by interacting toy characters, as evidenced by how they chose to distribute the given reward tokens between them [3]
The increase of the beta rhythm power can often be seen in the process of making socially significant decisions, as well as when subjects observe the emotions of other people [5]

Summary

Introduction

The formation of moral behavior gets its start in the earliest months of a child’s life [1]. It was shown that, starting from the age of 18 months, children are already capable of discriminating between pro- and antisocial behaviors demonstrated by interacting toy characters, as evidenced by how they chose to distribute the given reward tokens between them [3]. Of particular interest are the patterns of the EEG beta and theta rhythm power changes in children when they make decisions on how to distribute the given reward, relative to their background EEG activity. It is shown in many studies that an increase in theta rhythm power may reflect the activation of processes related to memorization and emotional regulation. The increase of the beta rhythm power can often be seen in the process of making socially significant decisions, as well as when subjects observe the emotions of other people [5]

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