Abstract
Context-appropriate infant physiological functioning may support emotion regulation and mother-infant emotion coregulation. Among a sample of 210 low-income Mexican-origin mothers and their 24-week-old infants, dynamic structural equation modeling (DSEM) was used to examine whether within-infant vagal functioning accounted for between-dyad differences in within-dyad second-by-second emotion regulation and coregulation during free play. Vagal functioning was captured by within-infant mean and variability (standard deviation) of respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) during free play. Infant emotion regulation was quantified as emotional equilibria (within-person mean), volatility (within-person deviation from equilibrium), carryover (how quickly equilibrium is restored following a disturbance), and feedback loops (the extent to which prior affect dampens or amplifies subsequent affect) in positive and negative affect during free play; coregulation was quantified as the influence of one partner's affect on the other's subsequent affect. Among infants with lower RSA variability, positive affect fluctuated around a higher equilibrium, and negative affect fluctuated around a lower equilibrium; these infants exhibited feedback loops where their positive affect dampened their subsequent negative affect. As expected, infants with higher mean RSA exhibited more volatility in positive affect, feedback loops between their positive and negative affect, and stronger mother-driven emotion coregulation. The results highlight differences in simultaneously occurring biological and emotion regulation.
Highlights
Developmental milestones include the effective regulation of one’s emotions and their expression in response to contextual demands (Cole, Michel, & Teti, 1994)
Two augmented Dickey–Fuller unit root tests for stationarity were conducted per time series per dyad – one was to determine whether the series was nonzero-mean stationary and the other to determine whether the series was linear timetrend stationary
Stationarity on infant positive affect and maternal positive affect did not differ depending on the infant mean or SD of respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), maternal sociodemographic characteristics, or birth outcomes
Summary
Developmental milestones include the effective regulation of one’s emotions and their expression in response to contextual demands (Cole, Michel, & Teti, 1994). Low-income Mexican American children exhibit poorer self-regulation and interpersonal skills relative to their White peers (e.g., Galindo & Fuller, 2010) Relative to their ethnic majority, socioeconomically advantaged counterparts, low-income, Mexican-origin and immigrant mothers in the United States are at elevated risk for poor mental health (e.g., Beck, Froman, & Bernal, 2005; Kuo et al, 2004), which in turn jeopardizes their children’s development of selfregulatory skills and emotional wellbeing (e.g., Goodman et al, 2011). Context-inappropriate infant RSA may impair infant emotion regulation and limit infants from reaping the benefits of maternal regulatory support (e.g., Feldman, 2015; Feldman & Eidelman, 2007; Porter, 2003)
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