Infant Emotion Research Articles

Security priming improves attentional processing to infant emotions among insecurely attached women: The different roles of supraliminal and subliminal priming

In two ERP experiments, we examined the attention-related mechanism involved in perceiving infant emotions following exposure to security priming. Specifically, we examined how security priming affected securely and insecurely attached women. We found that both supraliminal and subliminal security priming resulted in increased attention allocation in anxiously and avoidantly attached women but had no effect on securely attached women. Moreover, we also found that supraliminal and subliminal security priming differed in their effectiveness in increasing attention allocation among anxiously and avoidantly attached women. Supraliminal security priming were more effective for anxiously attached women, whereas subliminal security priming were more effective for avoidantly attached women. The implications of these findings and directions for future research are discussed.

Something old, something new: Leveraging what we know to optimize new directions in emotion development research.

The 3 papers by Hammond and Drummond (2019), LoBue and Adolph (2019), and Stern, Botdorf, Cassidy, and Riggins (2019) bring into focus some of the exciting and promising new directions emerging in the field of emotional development. This commentary urges researchers moving in these new directions to leverage what is already known about emotional development to inform future predictions and interpretations, as well as to remain mindful of the thorny but essential questions surrounding the conceptualization, measurement, and interpretation of emotions. These points are illustrated with a focus on 2 specific topics. The first concerns how we conceptualize positive and negative emotions and what we might predict about their respective psychological and behavioral effects. The second concerns what should (not) count as evidence of an emotion in infants and young children and highlights the importance of converging evidence across methods and measures as well as of validating measures. This extends to the study of emotional mechanisms such as empathy and sympathy. Considering these questions carefully at this juncture has the potential to make the future study of emotional development all the more fruitful and effective. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Motor activity and spatial proximity: Relationships to infant emotions and maternal postpartum depression

The ability to express emotions is a protective factor for infant development. Despite the multimodal nature of emotion expression, research has mainly focused on facial expressions of emotions. The present study examined motor activity and spatial proximity in relation to positive and negative infant facial expressions and maternal postpartum depression during face-to-face interactions at four months. Video cameras and a motion capture system recorded mother-infant interactions. Repeated measures ANOVAs were conducted to analyze the effect of micro-coded infant positive and negative facial affect and maternal depression diagnosis on automatically extracted measures of motor activity and spatial proximity, including speed of mothers’ arm movements (nondepressed = 32; PPD = 16), and infants’ arm movements (nondepressed = 29; PPD = 17), and head distance (nondepressed = 45; PPD = 27). Results showed that the speed of infants’ arm movements and head distance were greater during negative compared to positive infant affect. Further, the results demonstrated that the speed of PPD mothers’ arm movements was slower than the speed of nondepressed mothers’ arm movements. In the discussion, it is suggested that increased speed of infant arm movements during negative affect functions to elicit faster caregiving responses, and that increased head distance during negative infant affect functions to decrease the intensity of the interaction. Finally, the slower speed of arm movements in PPD mothers suggests psychomotor retardation, which is proposed to limit these mothers’ abilities to engage their infants during the interaction.

Postnatal mental health and mothers’ processing of infant emotion: an eye-tracking study

ABSTRACTBackgroundPostnatal mental illnesses are associated with less maternal sensitivity. Differences in how mothers with and without mental illness process infant emotions could explain this. People with mental illness in non-perinatal populations show certain processing patterns when viewing emotional faces, but it is not clear whether these patterns are present in mothers.ObjectiveCompared to mothers without affective symptoms (anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress). Task 1 aimed to identify whether mothers with affective symptoms show an attentional bias towards negative infant faces; and Task 2 aimed to identify whether mothers with affective symptoms look less at infants’ eyes compared to eyes and mouth.DesignAn experimental design was used in two tasks to answer the research objective.MethodsMothers with affective symptoms (n = 23) and without affective symptoms (n = 47) had their eye movements tracked whilst: Task 1, viewing pairs of infant faces; and Task 2, viewing morphed infant faces.ResultsIn Task 1 mothers with affective symptoms were more likely to fixate first on neutral faces when the choice was between negative and neutral. In Task 2, no differences were found between groups.ConclusionsThe findings from Task 1 are unexpected given previous research. More research is needed to identify potential explanations for this.

Developmental Trajectories of Maternal Sensitivity across the First Year of Life: Relations among Emotion Competence and Dyadic Reciprocity

SYNOPSISObjective. Maternal sensitivity is a commonly used construct to capture the quality of mother–child interactions, but inconsistencies in conceptualizing and defining maternal sensitivity limit understanding of how sensitive caregiving may be associated with child development. The purposes of this study are to (1) examine and compare the developmental trajectories of individual maternal sensitivity behaviors to that of a global index of sensitivity across the first year of infant life and (2) determine whether differences in trajectories of sensitivity are meaningful for infant emotion competence and dyadic reciprocity at 12 months. Design. A total of 322 low-income, Mexican American mothers and infants were observed during a free play task at 3, 4.5, 6, and 12 months. Observations were coded for 11 distinct behaviors known to compose maternal sensitivity. At 12 months, mother-infant interactions were also coded for dyadic reciprocity, and mothers reported on infant emotion competence. Results. Latent growth models indicated that individual sensitivity behaviors differed from the global index of sensitivity with respect to initial levels and slopes, with increasing (e.g., vocal appropriateness), decreasing (e.g., touch), and stable (e.g., elaboration) trajectories. The individual and global indices of sensitivity differed in prediction of emotion competence and dyadic reciprocity. Trajectories of global and individual indices of maternal sensitivity operated similarly in predicting dyadic reciprocity, with the exception of consistency of style. In contrast, the global index of sensitivity was unrelated to emotion competence, and only initial levels of positive affect emerged as significant predictors of emotion competence. Conclusions. The findings offer a more nuanced understanding of maternal sensitivity and suggest that component aspects of maternal sensitivity uniquely contribute to child and family competencies.

Transgenerational associations between maternal childhood stress exposure and profiles of infant emotional reactivity.

Childhood exposure to stress can induce prolonged negative effects on health, which in turn confer risks for the next generation, but greater specificity is needed to inform intervention. A first step is to measure individual differences in emotional reactivity to stress early in life in ways that can account for heterogeneity in child exposure. The present study tested the hypothesis that mothers' childhood exposure to stress would be differentially associated with patterns of positive and negative emotional reactivity in their offspring, suggesting transmission of stress response across generations. Participants were 268 young mothers (age 14-23 years) followed longitudinally since childhood, and their infants aged 3-9 months. Latent class analysis of infant emotions expressed before and during the still-face paradigm yielded five subgroups that varied in valence, intensity, and reactivity. After accounting for sociodemographic factors, infant temperament, and postpartum depression, multinomial regression models showed that, relative to an emotionally regulated still-face response, infants showing low negative reactivity were more likely to have mothers exposed to childhood emotional abuse, and infants showing high and increasing negative reactivity were more likely to have mothers exposed to childhood emotional neglect. Mechanisms by which early maternal stress exposure influences emotional reactivity in offspring are discussed.

Color perception influences attention processing in females with different attachment styles

Secure and insecure attachment are associated with different patterns of attention to infant emotions. However, accumulating evidence suggests that color perception influences emotional processing, especially the color red, which may represent threatening information. To explore whether the red color context has a modulating effect on attention processing of infant emotions between adult females with insecure attachment and those with secure attachment, the brain activity was measured using event-related potentials. We found that, relative to a green context, a red context elevated the early attention vigilance (P1 amplitude) to neutral infant faces in anxious females and, later, motivation attention (P3 amplitude) to neutral infant faces in secure females compared to avoidant females. Furthermore, a red context also elevated the P1 amplitude to crying infant faces in avoidant females. The present findings suggested that a red context, which may represent threatening information, elicits processing defects in attention to infant emotions in anxious and avoidant females, whereas it produces an enhanced effect on attention function in secure females.

The Effect of Forest Experience Activity on Infant Emotional Adjustment Ability and Problem Behavior

본 연구의 목적은 유아의 숲 체험활동이 정서조절능력 및 문제행동에 어떠한 영향이 있는 지 알아보는 데 있다 이를 위해 경기도 시 관내 어린이집 곳에서 만 세 유아 명을 대상으로 어린이집 근처 인근 숲에서 누리과정요소와 연결하여 자유롭게 자연물을 탐색하고 오감 으로 숲을 체험하는 자연 탐구활동을 바탕으로 진행되었다 또한 숲 체험 활동은 숲의 다양한 요소들을 체험하고 이해하는 과정으로 진행되었다 숲 체험 활동은 약 개월 동안 진행되었으며 주 회 총 차시에 걸쳐 실시되었고 부모평정을 통해 측정되었다 연구 결과는 다음과 같다 첫째 숲 체험 활동은 부모가 지각한 유아의 정서조절능력 향상에 긍정적 영향을 미쳤다 둘째 숲 체험 활동은 유아의 문제행동 감소에 긍정적 영향을 미치는 것으로 확인되었다This study is intended to look into the effect of forest experience activities on emotion control capacity and problem behavior. The survey of this research was answered by 116 parents of infants at the kindergarten in H, Gyeonggi Province. The participants of this study were sampled from three kindergartens. The main experiential activities were the process of experiencing and understanding various elements of the forest. The forest experience activity was conducted for about 5 months and was conducted once a week for 17 times. The results of this study were summarized as follows. First, the forest experience activity had a positive influence on improving the emotional control ability of the infant perceived by the parents. Second, forest activity activities have positive influences on reducing the problem behaviors of young children.

Categorical Perception of Facial Emotions in Infancy.

Categorical perception, indicated by superior discrimination between stimuli that cross categorical boundaries than between stimuli within a category, is an efficient manner of classification. The current study examined the development of categorical perception of emotional stimuli in infancy. We used morphed facial images to investigate whether infants find contrasts between emotional facial images that cross categorical boundaries to be more salient than those that do not, while matching the degree of differences in the two contrasts. Five-month-olds exhibited sensitivity to the categorical boundary between sadness and disgust, between happiness and surprise, as well as between sadness and anger but not between anger and disgust. Even 9-month-olds failed to exhibit evidence of a definitive category boundary between anger and disgust. These findings indicate the presence of discrete boundaries between some, but not all, of the basic emotions early in life. Implications of these findings for the major theories of emotion representation are discussed.

Baby Faces: Development and psychometric study of a stimuli set based on babies’ emotions

BackgroundSets of stimuli from babies’ facial emotions provide a good instrument to detect the recognition of facial emotion (RFE) in clinical and non clinical groups. However, specificities from the stimuli have not been widely explored and validated by previous studies. New methodWe presented a new set of facial stimuli from infants aged 6–12 months, both sexes, different races, representing five basic emotions. We also present the psychometric properties of validity/reliability for each stimulus and assess whether the sociodemographic characteristics of the stimuli and the subjects affect the RFE. ResultsThe stimuli were obtained by a standardized protocol of activities to elicit emotions and 72 stimuli were developed. A total of 119 subjects from the community were selected for the psychometric analysis of the stimuli. The set produced indicators of validity (mean 62.5%) and reliability. Stimuli were evaluated using the Rash model and 15 stimuli had indicators of unpredictability and unmodeled residuals. The difficulty index of each stimulus was calculated, evidencing that the set was normally distributed. Comparison with existing methodPreviously published methods are limited in terms of racial diversity, standardisation of the elicitation of emotions, procedure of stimuli extraction, and psychometric evidence. ConclusionsThe findings reinforced the Differential Emotion Theory regarding the expression of basic emotions in infants and evidenced the effect of education level on emotion recognition to the detriment of other sociocultural characteristics (sex and race). This set is freely accessible by email request.

The Impact of Caregiving on the Association Between Infant Emotional Behavior and Resting State Neural Network Functional Topology.

The extent to which neural networks underlying emotional behavior in infancy serve as precursors of later behavioral and emotional problems is unclear. Even less is known about caregiving influences on these early brain-behavior relationships. To study brain-emotional behavior relationships in infants, we examined resting-state functional network metrics and infant emotional behavior in the context of early maternal caregiving. We assessed 46 3-month-old infants and their mothers from a community sample. Infants underwent functional MRI during sleep. Resting-state data were processed using graph theory techniques to examine specific nodal metrics as indicators of network functionality. Infant positive and negative emotional behaviors, and positive, negative and mental-state talk (MST) indices of maternal caregiving were coded independently from filmed interactions. Regression analyses tested associations among nodal metrics and infant emotionality, and the moderating effects of maternal behavior on these relationships. All results were FDR corrected at alpha = 0.05. While relationships between infant emotional behavior or maternal caregiving, and nodal metrics were weak, higher levels of maternal MST strengthened associations between infant positive emotionality and nodal metrics within prefrontal (p < 0.0001), and occipital (p < 0.0001) cortices more generally. Positive and negative aspects of maternal caregiving had little effect. Our findings suggest that maternal MST may play an important role in strengthening links between emotion regulation neural circuitry and early infant positive behavior. They also provide objective neural markers that could inform and monitor caregiving-based interventions designed to improve the health and well-being of vulnerable infants at-risk for behavioral and emotional problems.

Patterns of RSA and observed distress during the still-face paradigm predict later attachment, compliance and behavior problems: A person-centered approach.

This study examined profiles of infant observed distress and physiological regulation indexed by respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) levels during the still-face paradigm at 6months using a person-centered approach. Mothers and infants (N=206) participated in the study when infants were 6months, 1year, and 2years old. Attachment was assessed at 1year via the Strange Situation. Children's compliance behaviors were assessed at 2years during a toy clean-up task. Mothers reported children's behavior problems at 4.5years. Latent profile analysis yielded four profiles: highly distressed, but regulating; over-regulated; resilient to distress; and under-regulated. Infants in the "resilient to distress" profile characterized by high RSA levels and low negative affect exhibited the most adaptive outcomes such as lower attachment avoidance, higher compliance, and lower behavior problems. Therefore, this study highlights the importance of considering patterns of behavioral and physiological indicators of infant emotionality together for understanding adaptive functioning.

Individual differences in infants’ neural responses to their peers’ cry and laughter

Infants’ ability to process others’ emotional expressions is fundamental for their social development. While infants’ processing of emotions expressed by faces and speech has been more extensively investigated, less is known about how infants process non-verbal vocalizations of emotions. Here, we recorded frontal N100, P200, and LPC event-related potentials (ERPs) from 8-month-old infants listening to sounds of other infants crying, laughing, and coughing. Infants’ temperament was measured via parental report. Results showed that processing of emotional information from non-verbal vocalizations was associated with more negative N100 and greater LPC amplitudes for peer’s crying sounds relative to positive and neutral sounds. Temperament was further related to the N100, P200, and LPC difference scores between conditions. One important finding was that infants with improved ability to regulate arousal exhibited increased sustained processing of peers’ cry sounds compared to both laughter and cough sounds. These results emphasize the relevance of considering the temperamental characteristics in understanding the development of infant emotion information processing, as well as for formulating comprehensive theoretical models of typical and atypical social development.

The protective role of maternal post-traumatic growth and cognitive trauma processing in Palestinian mothers and infants: a longitudinal study

BackgroundWomen at pre partum and post partum are especially susceptible to war trauma because they struggle to protect their infants from danger. Trauma research suggests increased problems in maternal mental health and infant development. Yet many cognitive-emotional processes affect the trauma survivors' mental health, such as post-traumatic growth and post-traumatic cognition. The aim of this study was to examine whether a mother's high post-traumatic growth and optimal post-traumatic cognition could protect their own mental health and their infant's stress regulation from the effects of traumatic war experiences. MethodsThis three-wave prospective study involved Palestinian women living in the Gaza Strip who were at the second trimester of pregnancy (T1), women with infants aged 4 months (T2), and women with children aged 12 months (T3) months. The participants reported their war experiences in a 30-item checklist of losses, destruction, and atrocities in the 2008–09, 2012, and 2014 military offensives. Post-traumatic growth was assessed by a 21-item scale and post-traumatic cognition by a 36-item scale. Maternal mental health was assessed by post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depressive, anxiety, and dissociation symptoms at T1 and T3, and infants' stress regulation was assessed with the Infant Behaviour Questionnaire at T2 and T3. FindingsWe included 511 women at T1, 481 women at T2, and 454 women at T3. High maternal post-traumatic growth and post-traumatic cognition had protective roles. Post-traumatic growth had a protective effect on maternal mental health since severe exposure to traumatic war experiences was not associated with maternal PTSD, depression, and dissociation if women showed high post-traumatic growth, as indicated by the significant interaction effect between post-traumatic growth and war trauma on each of the three symptoms. Post-traumatic cognition had a protective effect on infant development since severe exposure was not associated with dysfunctional infant emotion regulation when mothers reported optimal post-traumatic cognition, as indicated by the significant interaction effect between post-traumatic cognition and war trauma on each of negative affectivity and surgency or extraversion. InterpretationThe nature of cognitive emotional processing of war trauma could explain the distinct roles of post-traumatic growth and post-traumatic cognition. High post-traumatic growth involves increased social affiliation, spiritual awareness, and psychological strengths resulting from painful and traumatic experiences. In the national struggle for independence, post-traumatic growth is often associated with heroism and even hardiness, which might benefit a mother's mental health but not their infant's wellbeing. Optimal post-traumatic cognition indicates successful and harmonious trauma processing, which enables mothers to be more reflective and sensitive to their infant's needs. Interventions to promote healthy infant development in war settings should encourage and support mothers' effective cognitive-emotional processing of traumatic experiences. FundingThe Academy of Finland and University of Tampere, Finland.

Structural variations, quantitative differences and similarities between maternal and paternal infant-directed speech

ABSTRACTWe compared systematically the structure, the focus, the thematic sequences, the complexity and the syntactic properties between maternal and paternal infant-directed speech in engagements of infants with their mothers and fathers. Eleven mother–infant and 11 father–infant dyads were video-recorded during their natural interactions at home from the second to the sixth month after birth. Micro-analysis of maternal and paternal infant-directed speech within well-defined units and subunits of analysis revealed: (a) structural variations that gave a higher index of more and shorter in duration units and subunits in father–infant, compared to mother–infant, interactions; (b) quantitative differences that favour mother–infant interactions in the content of focused infant-directed speech; and (c) quantitative similarity of maternal and paternal references to infant emotions and ‘sharing’. These results are discussed in the frame of the theory of innate intersubjectivity and of the company and care both parents give to developing infants.

The development of spontaneous facial responses to others\u2019 emotions in infancy: An EMG study

Viewing facial expressions often evokes facial responses in the observer. These spontaneous facial reactions (SFRs) are believed to play an important role for social interactions. However, their developmental trajectory and the underlying neurocognitive mechanisms are still little understood. In the current study, 4- and 7-month old infants were presented with facial expressions of happiness, anger, and fear. Electromyography (EMG) was used to measure activation in muscles relevant for forming these expressions: zygomaticus major (smiling), corrugator supercilii (frowning), and frontalis (forehead raising). The results indicated no selective activation of the facial muscles for the expressions in 4-month-old infants. For 7-month-old infants, evidence for selective facial reactions was found especially for happy (leading to increased zygomaticus major activation) and fearful faces (leading to increased frontalis activation), while angry faces did not show a clear differential response. These results suggest that emotional SFRs may be the result of complex neurocognitive mechanisms which lead to partial mimicry but are also likely to be influenced by evaluative processes. Such mechanisms seem to undergo important developments at least until the second half of the first year of life.

Dopamine receptor D2 (DRD2), dopamine transporter solute carrier family C6, member 4 (SLC6A3), and catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) genes as moderators of the relation between maternal history of maltreatment and infant emotion regulation.

Although infants less than 18 months old are capable of engaging in self-regulatory behavior (e.g., avoidance, withdrawal, and orienting to other aspects of their environment), the use of self-regulatory strategies at this age (as opposed to relying on caregivers) is associated with elevated behavioral and physiological distress. This study investigated infant dopamine-related genotypes (dopamine receptor D2 [DRD2], dopamine transporter solute carrier family C6, member 4 [SLC6A3], and catechol-O-methyltransferase [COMT]) as they interact with maternal self-reported history of maltreatment to predict observed infant independent emotion regulation behavior. A community sample (N = 193) of mother-infant dyads participated in a toy frustration challenge at infant age 15 months, and infant emotion regulation behavior was coded. Buccal cells were collected for genotyping. Maternal maltreatment history significantly interacted with infant SLC6A3 and COMT genotypes, such that infants with more 10-repeat and valine alleles of SLC6A3 and COMT, respectively, relative to infants with fewer or no 10-repeat and valine alleles, utilized more independent (i.e., maladaptive) regulatory behavior if mother reported a more extensive maltreatment history, as opposed to less. The findings indicate that child genetic factors moderate the intergenerational impact of maternal maltreatment history. The results are discussed in terms of potential mechanism of Gene × Environment interaction.

The Infant Version of the Laboratory Temperament Assessment Battery (Lab-TAB): Measurement Properties and Implications for Concepts of Temperament.

We describe large-sample research using the Infant Laboratory Temperament Assessment Battery (Lab-TAB; Goldsmith and Rothbart, 1996) in 1,076 infants at 6 and 12 months of age. The Lab-TAB was designed to assess temperament dimensions through a series of episodes that mimic everyday situations. Our goal is to provide guidelines for scoring Lab-TAB episodes to derive temperament composites. We also present a set of analyses examining mean differences and stability of temperament in early infancy, gender differences in infant temperament, as well as a validation of Lab-TAB episodes and composites with parent reported Infant Behavior Questionnaire (IBQ; Rothbart, 1981) scales. In general, laboratory observed temperament was only modestly related to parent reported temperament. However, temperament measures were significantly stable across time and several gender differences that align with previous research emerged. In sum, the Lab-TAB usefully assesses individual differences in infant emotionality.

Adult Attachment Styles Associated with Brain Activity in Response to Infant Faces in Nulliparous Women: An Event-Related Potentials Study.

Adult attachment style is a key for understanding emotion regulation and feelings of security in human interactions as well as for the construction of the caregiving system. The caregiving system is a group of representations about affiliative behaviors, which is guided by the caregiver’s sensitivity and empathy, and is mature in young adulthood. Appropriate perception and interpretation of infant emotions is a crucial component of the formation of a secure attachment relationship between infant and caregiver. As attachment styles influence the ways in which people perceive emotional information, we examined how different attachment styles associated with brain response to the perception of infant facial expressions in nulliparous females with secure, anxious, and avoidant attachment styles. The event-related potentials of 65 nulliparous females were assessed during a facial recognition task with joy, neutral, and crying infant faces. The results showed that anxiously attached females exhibited larger N170 amplitudes than those with avoidant attachment in response to all infant faces. Regarding the P300 component, securely attached females showed larger amplitudes to all infant faces in comparison with avoidantly attached females. Moreover, anxiously attached females exhibited greater amplitudes than avoidantly attached females to only crying infant faces. In conclusion, the current results provide evidence that attachment style differences are associated with brain responses to the perception of infant faces. Furthermore, these findings further separate the psychological mechanisms underlying the caregiving behavior of those with anxious and avoidant attachment from secure attachment.

Recognizing facial expressions of emotion in infancy: A replication and extension

Infants may recognize facial expressions of emotion more readily when familiar faces express the emotions. Studies 1 and 2 investigated whether familiarity influences two metrics of emotion processing: Categorization and spontaneous preference. In Study 1 (n = 32), we replicated previous findings showing an asymmetrical pattern of categorization of happy and fearful faces in 6.5-month-old infants, and extended these findings by demonstrating that infants' categorization did not differ when emotions were expressed by familiar (i.e., caregiver) faces. In Study 2 (n = 34), we replicated the spontaneous preference for fearful over happy expressions in 6.5-month-old infants, and extended these findings by demonstrating that the spontaneous preference for fear was also present for familiar faces. Thus, infants' performance on two metrics of emotion processing did not differ depending on face familiarity.