Frontal EEG Activity Research Articles

Association of inattention with slow-spindle density in sleep EEG of children with attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder

ObjectiveWe evaluated the power of slow sleep spindles during sleep stage 2 to clarify their relationship with executive function, especially with attention, in children with attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). MethodsSubjects were 21 children with ADHD and 18 aged-matched, typically developing children (TDC). ADHD subjects were divided into groups of only ADHD and ADHD + autism spectrum disorder (ASD). We employed the Continuous Performance Test (CPT) to measure attention. We focused on sleep spindle frequencies (12–14 Hz) in sleep stage 2 and performed a power spectral analysis using fast Fourier transform techniques and compared sleep spindles with the variability of reaction time in CPT. ResultsIn the CPT, reaction variabilities in ADHD and ADHD + ASD significantly differed from those in TDC. Twelve-hertz spindles were mainly distributed in the frontal pole and frontal area and 14-Hz spindles in the central area. The ratio of 12-Hz frontal spindle power was higher in ADHD than in TDC, especially in ADHD + ASD. Significant correlation between the ratio of 12-Hz spindles and reaction time variability was observed. ConclusionsTwelve-hertz frontal spindle EEG activity may have positive associations with sustained attention function. Slow frontal spindles may be useful as a biomarker of inattention in children with ADHD.

Atypical Pattern of Frontal EEG Asymmetry for Direct Gaze in Young Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

This study examined approach-motivation related brain activity (frontal electroencephalogram [EEG] asymmetry) in response to direct and averted gaze in 3- to 6-year-old typically developing (TD) children, children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and those with intellectual disability (ID). We found that, in TD children, direct gaze elicited greater approach-related frontal EEG activity than did downcast gaze. This pattern of activity was in contrast to that observed in children with ASD, who showed greater approach-related activity in response to downcast gaze than to direct gaze. ID children did not differ in their responses to different gaze conditions. These findings indicate that another person’s direct gaze does not elicit approach-motivation related brain activity in young children with ASD.

PREDICTION OF DELIRIUM, MORTALITY, AND FALL RISK IN INPATIENTS USING BISPECTRAL EEG

Introduction Delirium is a prevalent yet under-diagnosed and under-treated condition. Although questionnaire instruments are capable of detecting delirium if implemented rigorously, they have not been effectively used due to their lack of efficiency in busy hospital workflows. Their subjective nature is also a drawback. Electroencephalography (EEG) can objectively detect the “diffuse slowing” of brain waves that is characteristic of delirium. While standard EEG is not suitable for mass screening due to its size, cost, and the expertise required for lead placement and interpretation, simplified two channel EEG devices can still be used to measure frontal EEG changes. Our goal was to investigate if frontal EEG activity could be used to detect delirium and to predict fall risk and mortality among elderly inpatients. Methods A single center, prospective design was used to collect frontal EEG activity (Fp1 and Fp2 EEG signals) from elderly patients (>55 yo) after admission or at the time of an emergency room visit. EEG features (band powers and different combinations of frequency bands) were calculated for both channels and averaged. A bispectral EEG score (“BSEEG score”) was calculated based on the distribution of the scores from the study participants, and normalized with a mean value of zero and one standard deviation (SD) above the mean as 1. The top 9 EEG features were selected using machine learning methods, Random Forest. Subjects were assessed for the clinical presence of delirium and the primary outcomes measured were fall history, and mortality. K-nearest neighbors, logistic regression, support vector machine (SVM), kernelized SVM, and neural network approaches were used to assess the ability of bispectral EEG to predict delirium status, falls and survival. Results EEG features and outcome data for 274 patients was available for analysis. Clinical presence of delirium and BSEEG score were significantly associated (P = 6.14 × 10-6; unadjusted, P= 1.17 × 10-5; adjusted). Of all the classification methods, kernelized SVM yielded the highest prediction accuracies of 69%, 89%, and 81%, for delirium status, falls and mortality, respectively. Hazard ratio (HR) for survival controlling for age, gender, CCI and delirium status based on one SD change of BSEEG score at the time of admission was 1.32, (CI = 1.03 to 1.70, P=0.026). Conclusions In our study, bispectral EEG in delirious elderly inpatients was able to predict patient outcomes including mortality and fall risks. Bispectral EEG monitoring may also be applicable in settings including the primary care clinic, emergency department, and in nursing home or home-care settings. Delirium is particularly dangerous when patients experience it outside of hospitals because they do not have medical attention available on site. The simple, noninvasive nature of a simplified EEG test makes it potentially ideal for routine screening. Potentially it can be used as a next vital sign to monitor the risk of delirium, mortality, and falls among elderly patients. As the aging population is expanding rapidly, such a test would be in high demand. This research was funded by This study was supported by the University of Iowa Research Foundation GAP funding award for Gen Shinozaki. Gen Shinozaki has grant support from NSF1664364 and K23 MH107654.

Frontal Brain Asymmetry and the Trajectory of Shyness Across the Early School Years.

Although resting right frontal electroencephalogram (EEG) asymmetry has been linked to avoidance and withdrawal-related behaviors such as shyness in previous cross-sectional studies, relatively little research has examined the influence of frontal brain electrical activity on the development of shyness in children using a prospective, longitudinal study design. Here, we tested whether resting frontal EEG asymmetry predicted the trajectory of children's shyness across five assessments. Children were enrolled in the study during the summer prior to grade 1 (N = 37; Mage = 6.39years, S.D. = 0.15years), at which time resting frontal EEG activity and maternal report of children's shyness were collected. Mothers then reported on their child's shyness over another four follow-up assessments, spanning 2years (winter of grade 1, summer prior to grade 2 entry, winter of grade 2, and summer prior to grade 3). Growth curve analysis revealed that children displaying greater relative right frontal EEG activity had lower levels of shyness relative to children exhibiting greater relative left frontal EEG activity at study enrollment (i.e., age 6), but displayed statistically significant linear increases in shyness across time, with the highest levels of shyness by the summer prior to grade 3 (i.e., age 8). There was, however, no relation between left frontal EEG asymmetry and change in shyness across time. These preliminary findings suggest that right frontal EEG asymmetry may reflect a biological diathesis for the growth of shyness during the early school years.

Perinatal depression effects: A narrative review

This narrative review summarizes publications from the last eight years (2010-2018) on the early interactions, developmental effects and physiological and biochemical profiles of perinatally depressed mothers and their infants. Depressed mothers are nonresponsive with their infants.The depressed mothers’ physiological profiles including low vagal activity, right frontal EEG activation and fMRI activation differences are consistent with the mothers’ lack of responsivity during interactions with their infants. Biomarkers of the mothers that would affect their mood states include elevated cortisol as well as low serotonin, dopamine and oxytocin levels. The infants of depressed mothers come to early interactions with a prenatal history of growth delays and less responsivity to fetal stimulation. At birth they have physiological and biochemical profiles that are similar to those of their mothers. They continue to show these profiles in later development (e.g. depressed vagal activity and elevated cortisol). Although their later behavior problems and cognitive delays have been attributed to the depressed mothers’ lack of responsivity during early interactions, these problems may also relate to their own lingering physiological and biochemical profiles. Keywords: Perinatally depression, Biomarkers

Maternal sensitivity during the first 3½ years of life predicts electrophysiological responding to and cognitive appraisals of infant crying at midlife.

This study examined the predictive significance of maternal sensitivity in early childhood for electrophysiological responding to and cognitive appraisals of infant crying at midlife in a sample of 73 adults (age = 39 years; 43 females; 58 parents) from the Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Risk and Adaptation. When listening to an infant crying, both parents and nonparents who had experienced higher levels of maternal sensitivity in early childhood (between 3 and 42 months of age) exhibited larger changes from rest toward greater relative left (vs. right) frontal EEG activation, reflecting an approach-oriented response to distress. Parents who had experienced greater maternal sensitivity in early childhood also made fewer negative causal attributions about the infant's crying; the association between sensitivity and attributions for infant crying was nonsignificant for nonparents. The current findings demonstrate that experiencing maternal sensitivity during the first 3½ years of life has long-term predictive significance for adults' processing of infant distress signals more than three decades later. (PsycINFO Database Record

Resting frontal brain asymmetry is linked to future depressive symptoms in women

This longitudinal pilot study examined whether baseline resting frontal electroencephalographic (EEG) asymmetry correlates with depressive symptoms during the most impaired two-week period in the following year. Current-source-density (CSD) transformed resting frontal EEG asymmetry, severity of depression symptoms (Beck Depression Inventory – II), and stress (indexed by negative life events; NLE) were recorded in never-depressed young adults with no current DSM-IV diagnosis (38 women, 16 men) at baseline. One year later, depression symptoms and NLEs experienced during the interim were assessed. Individuals who reported greater interim NLEs also endorsed interim higher depression symptoms, a pattern that replicated when first accounting for baseline stress and depression. For women, higher depression reported at follow-up was linked to lower left than right frontal EEG activity at baseline, a pattern that replicated when first accounting for depressive symptoms at baseline. Despite the modest sample size of the present analysis, findings are consistent with prior reports of sex differences in patterns of brain laterality and support the idea that CSD-referenced EEG asymmetry may be a risk marker for future depression in previously healthy young women.

Quantification of the Central Cardiovascular Network Applying the Normalized Short-time Partial Directed Coherence Approach in Healthy Subjects.

The central control of the autonomic nervous system (ANS) and the complex interplay of its components can be described by a functional integrated mode - the central autonomic network (CAN). CAN represents the integrated functioning and interaction between the central nervous system (CNS) and ANS (parasympathetic and sympathetic activity). This study investigates the central cardiovascular network (CCVN) as a part of the CAN, during which heart rate (HR), systolic blood pressure (SYS) and frontal EEG activity in 21 healthy subjects (CON) will be analysed. The objective of this study is to determine how these couplings (central-cardiovascular) are composed by the different regulatory aspects of the CNS-ANS interaction. To quantify the short-term instantaneous causal couplings within the CCVN, the normalized short time partial directed coherence (NSTPDC) approach was applied. It is based on an m-dimensional MAR process to determine Granger causality in the frequency domain. We found that CCVN were of bidirectional character, and that the causal influences of central activity towards HR were stronger than those towards systolic blood pressure. This suggests that the central-cardiac closed-loop regulation process in CON focuses mainly on adapting the heart rate via the sinoatrial node rather than focusing on SYS. The CNS-ANS coupling directions with respect to central spectral power bands were characterized as mostly bidirectional, where HR and SYS acted as drivers in nearly every frequency band (unidirectional for α, α1 and α2). This study provides a more indepth understanding of the interplay of neuronal and autonomic cardiovascular regulatory processes in healthy subjects, as well as a greater insight into the complex CAN.

Trajectories of frontal brain activity and socio-emotional development in children.

Asymmetric frontal brain activity is thought to reflect individual differences in approach- and avoidance-oriented motivation and emotional experience. Using a prospective longitudinal design, the authors investigated whether trajectories of frontal electroencephalogram (EEG) asymmetry in children (Mage = 6.39 years at enrollment) predicted subjective, behavioral, and autonomic indices of socioemotional processes. Resting frontal EEG activity was measured across four separate repeated assessments spanning approximately 2 years. Children's EEG asymmetry across assessments was best characterized by two trajectories: a stable right frontal asymmetry class (48.65%), and a stable left frontal asymmetry class (51.35%). At visit 4, children in the stable right frontal asymmetry displayed more avoidance-related tendencies and children in the stable left frontal asymmetry class exhibited more approach-related tendencies across social, emotional, and autonomic measures. These findings suggest that developmental patterns of resting frontal brain activity across the early school years may underlie approach- and avoidance-related motivation and predict socio-emotional processes in some children.

Enabling Free Movement EEG Tasks by Eye Fixation and Gyroscope Motion Correction: EEG Effects of Color Priming in Dress Shopping

The electroencephalogram (EEG) is a widely used tool for the non-invasive monitoring of the brain. However, it is very susceptible to motion artifacts, and current EEG studies are restricted to experiments where participants are stationary or perform only constrained movements, such as treadmill walking. This paper proposes a new multi-modal sensing approach for analyzing EEG collected during naturalistic free movement tasks. Co-recorded wearable eye-fixation and gyroscope data are used to identify times of interest for analysis and times of motion, and the EEG is then only analyzed during the short time periods when the eyes are fixated on wanted stimuli and there is a natural pause in the motion of the subject. We demonstrate the technique in a real-world task where subjects move round a clothes shop. This shows that in all cases, more than 65% of the time localized EEG could be analyzed, despite the free movement nature of the task. Furthermore, it can be used to demonstrate the effects of color priming in clothes shopping. We show an increase in left frontal EEG activity when participants view products matching the color background of the shop environment.

Depression symptom dimensions and asymmetrical frontal cortical activity while anticipating reward.

Unipolar depression has been characterized as involving diminished approach motivation and reward sensitivity. A psychophysiological indicator of approach motivation involves an asymmetry in frontal EEG activity, such that greater left relative to right frontal cortical activity indicates increased approach motivation. Consistent with the perspective of reduced approach motivation tendencies, depression has been associated with decreased relative left frontal cortical activity. To date, supporting research has primarily relied on categorical diagnoses or composite symptom counts. However, given the heterogeneity in depression, it is unclear what specific symptom dimensions relate to decreased relative left frontal cortical activity. The present study examined the association between multiple depression symptom dimensions and asymmetrical frontal cortical activity while anticipating reward in separate undergraduate (n = 75) and clinical samples (current major depressive disorder [n = 68] and never depressed controls [n = 67]). All participants completed the Inventory of Depression and Anxiety Symptoms, a self-report measure of factor-analytically derived symptom dimensions. Frontal cortical activity was assessed during a computerized slot machine task while participants anticipated potential monetary reward or no incentive. In undergraduates with low depression symptoms and never depressed controls, reward trials relative to no-incentive trials elicited greater relative left frontal cortical activity. Furthermore, in both samples across all participants, increased dysphoria and lassitude symptoms were associated with decreased relative left frontal cortical activity while anticipating reward. The present study suggests that depression symptoms consistent with motivational disengagement are associated with decreased relative left frontal cortical activity.

Bilingual experience shapes language processing: Evidence from codeswitching

Abstract We report three experiments on two groups of Spanish–English bilinguals who differed in codeswitching experience (codeswitchers and non-codeswitchers) to examine how different production choices predict comprehension difficulty. Experiment 1 examined the processing of gender congruent and gender incongruent determiner-noun switches in sentential contexts using event-related potentials. While codeswitchers demonstrated N400 sensitivity to congruency manipulations, non-codeswitchers showed a modulation of early frontal EEG activity to switching, regardless of switch type. Experiment 2 validated the translation-equivalent target words compared in Experiment 1. In Experiment 3, the bilinguals who participated in Experiment 1 completed a task that elicited naturally-produced codeswitched speech. Codeswitchers switched more often than non-codeswitchers, and their switches robustly reflected the conditions that were more easily processed in Experiment 1. Together, the results indicate the comprehension system becomes optimally attuned to variation in the input, and demonstrate that switching costs depend on the type of codeswitch and bilinguals’ language experience.

Gender Differences in Brain Activity during Exposure to Emotional Film Clips: an EEG Study

(ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.)Electroencephalogram (EEG) reflects the electrical activity occurring in the brain as a result of neuronal processing and signal flow across the nerve cells, nerve fibres, and synapses. The EEG response of one's brain is known to vary depending on changes in mental states such as different stages of sleep and wakefulness, different emotional states, cognitive performance such as reasoning and decision making, motor and ideomotor (imagined motor) acts like mental rotation. EEG has the advantage over other functional brain imaging tools such as Positron Emission Tomography (PET), functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI), functional Near Infra-Red Spectroscopy (fNIRS), that it is non-invasive and that it has superior temporal resolution. Hence, EEG signals as psychophysical markers for monitoring mental states have been gaining importance especially in the domain of social, affective, and cognitive neuroscience. Some evidence already suggests that emotionally arousing films have different impact on male and female audiences. This research intended to investigate whether the nature of such gender difference could be captured in terms of EEG response while viewing film clips depicting various kinds of emotions embedded within familiar social contexts.Gender differences in emotion expression and physiologySex differences in emotion expression, experience and physiology have been studied extensively by many researchers. It has been reported that significant gender difference arises in the expressive component of emotion, with more valance and arousal scores in women compared to men (Ashmore, 1990; Brody & Hall, 1993; Kring & Gordon, 1998). Such differences in emotional expressiveness have been reported to be more pronounced in relation to specific emotion categories: sadness, disgust, fear, surprise, happiness or smiling, and anger (Barr & Kleck, 1995; Kring & Gordon, 1998; Tucker & Riggio, 1988; Wagner, Buck, & Winterbotham, 1993).Some studies have reviewed sex differences in emotional memory encoding and recall (Hamann & Canli, 2004). A PET study by Cahill and colleagues (2001) reported significantly more left sided amygdale activity in female participants during memory encoding, as well as more right sided amygdale activity in male participants during a similar task (Canli, Desmond, Zhao, & Gabrieli, 2002). An fMRI study using event related paradigm reported a greater integration of emotional experience and memory for females compared to males (Canli et al., 2002). Sex differences have also been reported during emotional memory retrieval. In one study, female brains revealed significantly greater activation in the bilateral posterior hippocampus and the cerebellum, and significantly less activity in medial pre-frontal cortex compared to male brains (Bremner et al., 2001). Various EEG studies have reported converging evidence that predominant left frontal EEG activity is associated with the processing of positive affects while viewing film clips containing pleasant scenes, and listening to pleasant music, whereas predominant right frontal EEG activity is consistently linked with the processing of negative affects during exposure to film clips containing unpleasant scenes and listening to unpleasant musical emotions (Jones & Fox, 1992; Schmidt & Trainor, 2001). Wang, Nie, and Lu (2014) reported a movie induction experiment that spontaneously lead subjects to real emotional states and simultaneously have their EEG data recorded. They found that power spectrum feature is a suitable EEG feature for emotion classification. Also, they reported that the trajectory of emotion changes can be visualized by reducing subject-independent features with machine learning algorithms.Using the event-related potential (ERP) paradigm, many researchers reported significant sex difference in processing emotional salience in voice (Schirmer & Kotz, 2003; Schirmer et al. …

Forehead EEG in Support of Future Feasible Personal Healthcare Solutions: Sleep Management, Headache Prevention, and Depression Treatment

There are current limitations in the recording technologies for measuring EEG activity in clinical and experimental applications. Acquisition systems involving wet electrodes are time-consuming and uncomfortable for the user. Furthermore, dehydration of the gel affects the quality of the acquired data and reliability of long-term monitoring. As a result, dry electrodes may be used to facilitate the transition from neuroscience research or clinical practice to real-life applications. EEG signals can be easily obtained using dry electrodes on the forehead, which provides extensive information concerning various cognitive dysfunctions and disorders. This paper presents the usefulness of the forehead EEG with advanced sensing technology and signal processing algorithms to support people with healthcare needs, such as monitoring sleep, predicting headaches, and treating depression. The proposed system for evaluating sleep quality is capable of identifying five sleep stages to track nightly sleep patterns. Additionally, people with episodic migraines can be notified of an imminent migraine headache hours in advance through monitoring forehead EEG dynamics. The depression treatment screening system can predict the efficacy of rapid antidepressant agents. It is evident that frontal EEG activity is critically involved in sleep management, headache prevention, and depression treatment. The use of dry electrodes on the forehead allows for easy and rapid monitoring on an everyday basis. The advances in EEG recording and analysis ensure a promising future in support of personal healthcare solutions.

Pre- and Post-Natal Maternal Depressive Symptoms in Relation with Infant Frontal Function, Connectivity, and Behaviors.

This study investigated the relationships between pre- and early post-natal maternal depression and their changes with frontal electroencephalogram (EEG) activity and functional connectivity in 6- and 18-month olds, as well as externalizing and internalizing behaviors in 24-month olds (n = 258). Neither prenatal nor postnatal maternal depressive symptoms independently predicted neither the frontal EEG activity nor functional connectivity in 6- and 18-month infants. However, increasing maternal depressive symptoms from the prenatal to postnatal period predicted greater right frontal activity and relative right frontal asymmetry amongst 6-month infants but these finding were not observed amongst 18-month infants after adjusted for post-conceptual age on the EEG visit day. Subsequently increasing maternal depressive symptoms from the prenatal to postnatal period predicted lower right frontal connectivity within 18-month infants but not among 6-month infants after controlling for post-conceptual age on the EEG visit day. These findings were observed in the full sample and the female sample but not in the male sample. Moreover, both prenatal and early postnatal maternal depressive symptoms independently predicted children’s externalizing and internalizing behaviors at 24 months of age. This suggests that the altered frontal functional connectivity in infants born to mothers whose depressive symptomatology increases in the early postnatal period compared to that during pregnancy may reflect a neural basis for the familial transmission of phenotypes associated with mood disorders, particularly in girls.

Frontal Cortical Asymmetry May Partially Mediate the Influence of Social Power on Anger Expression.

When irritated by other people, powerful people usually tend to express their anger explicitly and directly, whereas people in less powerful positions are more likely not to show their feelings freely. The neural mechanism behind power and its influence on expression tendency has been scarcely explored. This study recorded frontal EEG activity at rest and frontal EEG activation while participants were engaged in a writing task describing an anger-eliciting event, in which they were irritated by people with higher or lower social power. Participants’ anger levels and expression inclination levels were self-reported on nine-point visual analog Likert scales, and also rated by independent raters based on the essays they had written. The results showed that high social power was indeed associated with greater anger expression tendency and greater left frontal activation than low social power. This is in line with the approach-inhibition theory of power. The mid-frontal asymmetric activation served as a partial mediator between social power and expression inclination. This effect may relate to the functions of the prefrontal cortex, which is in charge of information integration and evaluation and the control of motivation direction, as reported by previous studies.

Short and long-term effects of sham-controlled prefrontal EEG-neurofeedback training in healthy subjects.

In this study we evaluated long-term effects of frontal beta EEG-neurofeedback training (E-NFT) on healthy subjects. We hypothesized that E-NFT can change frontal beta activity in the long-term and that changes in frontal beta EEG activity are accompanied by altered cognitive performance. 25 healthy subjects were included and randomly assigned to active or sham E-NFT. On average the subjects underwent 15 E-NFT training sessions with a training duration of 45 min. Resting-state EEG was recorded prior to E-NFT training (t1) and in a 3-year follow-up (t3). Compared to sham E-NFT, which was used for the control group, real E-NFT increased beta activity in a predictable way. This increase was maintained over a period of three years post training. However, E-NFT did not result in significantly improved cognitive performance. Based on our results, we conclude that EEG-NFT can selectively modify EEG beta activity both in short and long-term. This is a sham controlled EEG neurofeedback study demonstrating long-term effects in resting state EEG.

Online News and Corporate Reputation

Abstract. We examined emotional, motivational, and evaluative responses to positively and negatively valenced online news messages about companies with a good or bad corporate reputation; the valence of reader comments on the news messages was also varied. In addition to self-report ratings, physiological measurements, including electroencephalography (EEG), facial electromyography (EMG), and electrodermal activity (EDA), were obtained continuously. Self-reported pleasure and willingness to use products/services, relative left frontal EEG activation (i.e., approach motivation), and EDA were higher for good-reputation companies compared with bad-reputation companies. The findings show that corporate reputation affects emotional and motivational processes and that the emotional tone of messages and reader comments in online news affects reputation formation.

Asymmetrical frontal cortical activity associated with differential risk for mood and anxiety disorder symptoms: An RDoC perspective

The recently launched NIMH Research Domain Criteria (RDoC) initiative aims to examine the relationship between core biobehavioral dimensions and symptom profiles that either cut across traditional disorder categories or that are unique to specific clinical phenomenon. A biobehavioral construct that has received considerable attention and that is directly relevant to the Positive Valence Systems domain of the RDoC initiative is approach motivation. One way approach motivation is frequently operationalized is left versus right frontal electroencephalographic (EEG) activity, with greater relative left frontal EEG activity reflecting increased approach motivation and decreased relative left frontal EEG activity reflecting decreased approach motivation or increased withdrawal tendencies. The objective of the present review paper is to examine the relationship between relative left frontal EEG activity and mood and anxiety related symptoms from an RDoC perspective. We first provide an overview of the approach–withdrawal motivational model of frontal EEG asymmetry. Second, we review evidence that relative left frontal EEG activity is associated with a differential risk for unipolar depression versus bipolar disorder. Third, and in line with the mission statement of the RDoC, we move beyond considering mood and anxiety disorders as unitary constructs or homogenous disorders and instead propose that individual differences in relative left frontal EEG activity may be uniquely associated with specific symptom clusters of depression (i.e., anhedonia), hypomania/mania (i.e., symptoms characterized by excessive approach motivation), and anxiety (i.e., anxious apprehension versus anxious arousal). Identifying the relationship between relative left frontal EEG activity and specific mood and anxiety-related symptom clusters has important implications for clinical science, assessment, and treatment.

Infant frontal asymmetry predicts child emotional availability

While factors influencing maternal emotional availability (EA) have been well investigated, little is known about the development of child EA. The present longitudinal study investigated the role of frontal brain asymmetry in young children with regard to child EA (child responsiveness and involvement) in mother–child interaction in a sample of 28 children at 7, 14, and 50 months of age. When infants were 7 months of age, mother–child interaction quality was assessed using the EA-Scales. At 14 months, infants’ resting asymmetric frontal activity was assessed by means of the electroencephalogram (EEG). When children were 50 months old, mother–child interaction quality was measured again. Analyses showed that relatively higher left frontal EEG activation was related to higher child involvement at 50 months, but not to child responsiveness. Those findings suggest a specific relation between individual differences in frontal asymmetry, and child approach and initiating behaviors in mother–child interaction.