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Fu X, Bolton SH, Morningstar M, Mattson WI, Feng X, Nelson EE. Young Children of Mothers with a History of Depression Show Attention Bias to Sad Faces: An Eye-tracking Study. Res Child Adolesc Psychopathol 2024; 52:1469-1483. [PMID: 38713348 PMCID: PMC11420269 DOI: 10.1007/s10802-024-01205-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 04/17/2024] [Indexed: 05/08/2024]
Abstract
Maternal depression is a predictor of the emergence of depression in the offspring. Attention bias (AB) to negative emotional stimuli in children may serve as a risk factor for children of depressed parents. The present study aimed to examine the effect of maternal major depressive disorder (MDD) history on AB to emotional faces in children at age four, before the age of onset for full-blown psychiatric symptoms. The study also compared AB patterns between mothers and their offspring. Fifty-eight mothers and their four-year-old children participated in this study, of which 27 high-risk (HR) children had mothers with MDD during their children's lifetime. Attention to emotional faces was measured in both children and their mothers using an eye-tracking visual search task. HR children exhibited faster detection and longer dwell time toward the sad than happy target faces. The low-risk (LR) children also displayed a sad bias but to a lesser degree. Children across both groups showed AB towards angry target faces, likely reflecting a normative AB pattern. Our findings indicate that AB to sad faces may serve as an early marker of depression risk. However, we provided limited support for the mother-child association of AB. Future research is needed to examine the longitudinal intergenerational transmission of AB related to depression and possible mechanisms underlying the emergence of AB in offspring of depressed parents.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xiaoxue Fu
- Department of Psychology, University of South Carolina, 29201, Columbia, SC, USA.
| | - Scout H Bolton
- Department of Psychological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO, USA
| | | | - Whitney I Mattson
- Center for Biobehavioral Health, Abigail Wexner Research Institute, Nationwide Children's Hospital, Columbus, OH, USA
| | - Xin Feng
- Department of Human and Family Sciences, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA
| | - Eric E Nelson
- Center for Biobehavioral Health, Abigail Wexner Research Institute, Nationwide Children's Hospital, Columbus, OH, USA
- Department of Pediatrics, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA
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Eskola E, Kataja EL, Hyönä J, Hakanen H, Nolvi S, Häikiö T, Pelto J, Karlsson H, Karlsson L, Korja R. Lower maternal emotional availability is related to increased attention toward fearful faces during infancy. Infant Behav Dev 2024; 74:101900. [PMID: 37979474 DOI: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2023.101900] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/03/2023] [Revised: 11/06/2023] [Accepted: 11/07/2023] [Indexed: 11/20/2023]
Abstract
It has been suggested that infants' age-typical attention biases for faces and facial expressions have an inherent connection with the parent-infant interaction. However, only a few previous studies have addressed this topic. To investigate the association between maternal caregiving behaviors and an infant's attention for emotional faces, 149 mother-infant dyads were assessed when the infants were 8 months. Caregiving behaviors were observed during free-play interactions and coded using the Emotional Availability Scales. The composite score of four parental dimensions, that are sensitivity, structuring, non-intrusiveness, and non-hostility, was used in the analyses. Attention disengagement from faces was measured using eye tracking and face-distractor paradigm with neutral, happy, and fearful faces and scrambled-face control pictures as stimuli. The main finding was that lower maternal emotional availability was related to an infant's higher attention to fearful faces (p = .042), when infant sex and maternal age, education, and concurrent depressive and anxiety symptoms were controlled. This finding indicates that low maternal emotional availability may sensitize infants' emotion processing system for the signals of fear at least during this specific age around 8 months. The significance of the increased attention toward fearful faces during infancy is an important topic for future research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Eeva Eskola
- University of Turku, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku, Finland; University of Turku, Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, Turku, Finland; Turku University Hospital, Expert Services, Turku, Finland.
| | - Eeva-Leena Kataja
- University of Turku, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku, Finland
| | - Jukka Hyönä
- University of Turku, Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, Turku, Finland
| | - Hetti Hakanen
- University of Turku, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku, Finland; University of Turku, Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, Turku, Finland
| | - Saara Nolvi
- University of Turku, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku, Finland; University of Turku, Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, Turku, Finland; University of Turku, Turku Institute for Advanced Studies, Turku, Finland
| | - Tuomo Häikiö
- University of Turku, Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, Turku, Finland
| | - Juho Pelto
- University of Turku, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku, Finland
| | - Hasse Karlsson
- University of Turku, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku, Finland; University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Department of Psychiatry, Turku, Finland; Centre for Population Health Research, University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Turku, Finland
| | - Linnea Karlsson
- University of Turku, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku, Finland; University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Department of Psychiatry, Turku, Finland; Centre for Population Health Research, University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Turku, Finland
| | - Riikka Korja
- University of Turku, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku, Finland; University of Turku, Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, Turku, Finland
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Gonçalves JL, Fuertes M, Silva S, Lopes-dos-Santos P, Ferreira-Santos F. Differential effects of attachment security on visual fixation to facial expressions of emotion in 14-month-old infants: an eye-tracking study. Front Psychol 2024; 15:1302657. [PMID: 38449748 PMCID: PMC10917067 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1302657] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/26/2023] [Accepted: 01/10/2024] [Indexed: 03/08/2024] Open
Abstract
Introduction Models of attachment and information processing suggest that the attention infants allocate to social information might occur in a schema-driven processing manner according to their attachment pattern. A major source of social information for infants consists of facial expressions of emotion. We tested for differences in attention to facial expressions and emotional discrimination between infants classified as securely attached (B), insecure-avoidant (A), and insecure-resistant (C). Methods Sixty-one 14-month-old infants participated in the Strange Situation Procedure and an experimental task of Visual Habituation and Visual Paired-Comparison Task (VPC). In the Habituation phase, a Low-Arousal Happy face (habituation face) was presented followed by a VPC task of 6 trials composed of two contrasting emotional faces always involving the same actress: the one used in habituation (trial old face) and a new one (trial new face) portraying changes in valence (Low-Arousal Angry face), arousal (High-Arousal Happy face), or valence + arousal (High-Arousal Angry face). Measures of fixation time (FT) and number of fixations (FC) were obtained for the habituation face, the trial old face, the trial new face, and the difference between the trial old face and the trial new face using an eye-tracking system. Results We found a higher FT and FC for the trial new face when compared with the trial old face, regardless of the emotional condition (valence, arousal, valence + arousal contrasts), suggesting that 14-month-old infants were able to discriminate different emotional faces. However, this effect differed according to attachment pattern: resistant-attached infants (C) had significantly higher FT and FC for the new face than patterns B and A, indicating they may remain hypervigilant toward emotional change. On the contrary, avoidant infants (A) revealed significantly longer looking times to the trial old face, suggesting overall avoidance of novel expressions and thus less sensitivity to emotional change. Discussion Overall, these findings corroborate that attachment is associated with infants' social information processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Joana L. Gonçalves
- Center for Research in Psychology for Positive Development, Lusíada University, Porto, Portugal
| | - Marina Fuertes
- Center for Psychology at University of Porto, Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
- Escola Superior de Educação, Instituto Politécnico de Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal
| | - Susana Silva
- Neurocognition and Language Research Group, Center for Psychology at University of Porto, Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
| | - Pedro Lopes-dos-Santos
- Center for Psychology at University of Porto, Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
- Faculty of Psychology and Education Science, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
| | - Fernando Ferreira-Santos
- Faculty of Psychology and Education Science, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
- Laboratory of Neuropsychophysiology, Faculty of Psychology and Education Science, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
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Hennessey EMP, Swales DA, Markant J, Hoffman MC, Hankin BL, Davis EP. Maternal anxiety during pregnancy predicts infant attention to affective faces. J Affect Disord 2024; 344:104-114. [PMID: 37802320 PMCID: PMC10841611 DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2023.09.031] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/21/2023] [Revised: 08/24/2023] [Accepted: 09/24/2023] [Indexed: 10/08/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Prenatal maternal anxiety is a known influence on offspring development. General anxiety and pregnancy-related anxiety (a distinct type of anxiety encompassing fears associated with pregnancy) are associated with offspring socioemotional development, with potential consequences for later emotional and behavioral problems. This study examines whether maternal pregnancy-related and general anxiety relate to infant attention to affective faces, a process which plays an integral role in early socioemotional development. METHODS Participants included 86 mothers and their 6-month-old infants (56.3 % female). Mothers completed measures of pregnancy-related and general anxiety three times through gestation. Infants' attention to affective faces was assessed with an eye-tracking task during which a series of face pairs were presented (happy, angry, or sad face paired with a neutral face). Overall attention measures included attention-holding (total looking time) and attention-orienting (latency to faces); affect-biased attention measures included proportion of total looking time to emotional faces and latency difference score. RESULTS Higher maternal pregnancy-related anxiety across gestation predicted decreased infant attention-holding to affective faces [F(1,80) = 7.232, p = .009, partial η2 = 0.083]. No differences were found in infant attention-orienting or affect-biased attention. LIMITATIONS Reliance on a correlational study design precludes the ability to make causal inferences. CONCLUSIONS Maternal pregnancy-related anxiety is an important predictor of child outcomes. We provide novel evidence that pregnancy-related anxiety predicts infant attention to emotional faces, behaviors which have important implications for socioemotional development. Providers may consider pregnancy-related anxiety as a target for screening and treatment that may benefit both pregnant individual and offspring.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Danielle A Swales
- Department of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA
| | - Julie Markant
- Department of Psychology & Tulane Brain Institute, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA, USA
| | - M Camille Hoffman
- Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Division of Maternal and Fetal Medicine, University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine, Aurora, CO, USA
| | - Benjamin L Hankin
- Department of Psychology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Champaign, IL, USA
| | - Elysia Poggi Davis
- Department of Psychology, University of Denver, Denver, CO, USA; Department of Pediatrics, University of California, Irvine, CA, USA
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Eskola E, Kataja EL, Hyönä J, Nolvi S, Häikiö T, Carter AS, Karlsson H, Karlsson L, Korja R. Higher attention bias for fear at 8 months of age is associated with better socioemotional competencies during toddlerhood. Infant Behav Dev 2023; 71:101838. [PMID: 36996588 DOI: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2023.101838] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/05/2022] [Revised: 03/17/2023] [Accepted: 03/22/2023] [Indexed: 03/30/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND In previous studies, an attention bias for signals of fear and threat has been related to socioemotional problems, such as anxiety symptoms, and socioemotional competencies, such as altruistic behaviors in children, adolescents and adults. However, previous studies lack evidence about these relations among infants and toddlers. AIMS Our aim was to study the association between the individual variance in attention bias for faces and, specifically, fearful faces during infancy and socioemotional problems and competencies during toddlerhood. STUDY DESIGN AND SUBJECTS The study sample was comprised of 245 children (112 girls). We explored attentional face and fear biases at the age of 8 months using eye tracking and the face-distractor paradigm with neutral, happy and fearful faces and a scrambled-face control stimulus. Socioemotional problems and competencies were reported by parents with the Brief Infant and Toddler Social Emotional Assessment (BITSEA) when children were 24 months old. OUTCOME MEASURES AND RESULTS A higher attentional fear bias at 8 months of age was related to higher levels of socioemotional competence at 24 months of age (β = .18, p = .008), when infants' sex and temperamental affectivity, maternal age, education and depressive symptoms were controlled. We found no significant association between attentional face or fear bias and socioemotional problems. CONCLUSIONS We found that the heightened attention bias for fearful faces was related to positive outcomes in early socioemotional development. Longitudinal study designs are needed to explore the changes in the relation between the attention bias for fear or threat and socioemotional development during early childhood.
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Wagner JB, Keehn B, Tager-Flusberg H, Nelson CA. Associations between attentional biases to fearful faces and social-emotional development in infants with and without an older sibling with autism. Infant Behav Dev 2023; 71:101811. [PMID: 36933374 PMCID: PMC10257765 DOI: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2023.101811] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/09/2022] [Revised: 01/09/2023] [Accepted: 01/10/2023] [Indexed: 03/18/2023]
Abstract
During the first year of life, infants become increasingly attuned to facial emotion, with heightened sensitivity to faces conveying threat observed by age seven months as illustrated through attentional biases (e.g., slower shifting away from fearful faces). Individual differences in these cognitive attentional biases have been discussed in relation to broader social-emotional functioning, and the current study examines these associations in infants with an older sibling with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), a group with an elevated likelihood of a subsequent ASD diagnosis (ELA; n = 33), and a group of infants with no family history of ASD who are at low likelihood of ASD (LLA; n = 24). All infants completed a task measuring disengagement of attention from faces at 12 months (fearful, happy, neutral), and caregivers completed the Infant-Toddler Social and Emotional Assessment at 12, 18, and/or 24 months. For the full sample, greater fear bias in attention disengagement at 12 months related to more internalizing behaviors at 18 months, and this was driven by the LLA infants. When examining groups separately, findings revealed that LLA with a greater fear bias had more difficult behaviors at 12, 18, and 24 months; in contrast, ELA showed the opposite pattern, and this was most pronounced for ELA who later received an ASD diagnosis. These preliminary group-level findings suggest that heightened sensitivity to fearful faces might serve an adaptive function in children who later receive an ASD diagnosis, but in infants with no family history of ASD, increased biases might reflect a marker of social-emotional difficulties.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jennifer B Wagner
- College of Staten Island, City University of New York, 2800 Victory Boulevard, Staten Island, NY 10314, USA; The Graduate Center, City University of New York, 365 5th Avenue, New York, NY 10016, USA.
| | - Brandon Keehn
- Purdue University, Lyles-Porter Hall, 715 Clinic Drive, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA
| | | | - Charles A Nelson
- Boston Children's Hospital/Harvard Medical School, 2 Brookline Place, Brookline, MA 02445, USA; Harvard Graduate School of Education, 13 Appian Way, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
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7
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Maternal symptoms of depression and anxiety during the postpartum period moderate infants' neural response to emotional faces of their mother and of female strangers. COGNITIVE, AFFECTIVE & BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCE 2022; 22:1370-1389. [PMID: 35799031 DOI: 10.3758/s13415-022-01022-y] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 06/17/2022] [Indexed: 01/27/2023]
Abstract
Affective exchanges between mothers and infants are key to the intergenerational transmission of depression and anxiety, possibly via adaptations in neural systems that support infants' attention to facial affect. The current study examined associations between postnatal maternal symptoms of depression, panic and social anxiety, maternal parenting behaviours, and infants' neural responses to emotional facial expressions portrayed by their mother and by female strangers. The Negative Central (Nc), an event-related potential component that indexes attention to salient stimuli and is sensitive to emotional expression, was recorded from 30 infants. Maternal sensitivity, intrusiveness, and warmth, as well as infant's positive engagement with their mothers, were coded from unstructured interactions. Mothers reporting higher levels of postnatal depression symptoms were rated by coders as less sensitive and warm, and their infants exhibited decreased positive engagement with the mothers. In contrast, postnatal maternal symptoms of panic and social anxiety were not significantly associated with experimenter-rated parenting behaviours. Additionally, infants of mothers reporting greater postnatal depression symptoms showed a smaller Nc to their own mother's facial expressions, whereas infants of mothers endorsing greater postnatal symptoms of panic demonstrated a larger Nc to fearful facial expressions posed by both their mother and female strangers. Together, these results suggest that maternal symptoms of depression and anxiety during the postpartum period have distinct effects on infants' neural responses to parent and stranger displays of emotion.
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Reilly EB, Dickerson KL, Pierce LJ, Leppänen J, Valdes V, Gharib A, Thompson BL, Schlueter LJ, Levitt P, Nelson CA. Maternal stress and development of infant attention to threat-related facial expressions. Dev Psychobiol 2022; 64:e22332. [PMID: 36282765 PMCID: PMC11071158 DOI: 10.1002/dev.22332] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/31/2022] [Revised: 08/01/2022] [Accepted: 08/30/2022] [Indexed: 01/27/2023]
Abstract
Attentional biases to threat-related stimuli, such as fearful and angry facial expressions, are important to survival and emerge early in development. Infants demonstrate an attentional bias to fearful facial expressions by 5-7 months of age and an attentional bias toward anger by 3 years of age that are modulated by experiential factors. In a longitudinal study of 87 mother-infant dyads from families predominantly experiencing low income, we examined whether maternal stress and depressive symptoms were associated with trajectories of attentional biases to threat, assessed during an attention disengagement eye-tracking task when infants were 6-, 9-, and 12-month old. By 9 months, infants demonstrated a generalized bias toward threat (both fearful and angry facial expressions). Maternal perceived stress was associated with the trajectory of the bias toward angry facial expressions between 6 and 12 months. Specifically, infants of mothers with higher perceived stress exhibited a greater bias toward angry facial expressions at 6 months that decreased across the next 6 months, compared to infants of mothers with lower perceived stress who displayed an increased bias to angry facial expressions over this age range. Maternal depressive symptoms and stressful life events were not associated with trajectories of infant attentional bias to anger or fear. These findings highlight the role of maternal perceptions of stress in shaping developmental trajectories of threat-alerting systems.
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Affiliation(s)
- Emily B. Reilly
- Institute of Child Development, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA
| | - Kelli L. Dickerson
- Department of Pediatrics, Division of Developmental Medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
- Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
| | - Lara J. Pierce
- Department of Psychology, York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
| | - Jukka Leppänen
- Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Viviane Valdes
- Department of Pediatrics, Division of Developmental Medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
| | - Alma Gharib
- Department of Pediatrics, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA
- Developmental Neuroscience and Neurogenetics Program, The Saban Research Institute, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA
| | - Barbara L. Thompson
- Department of Pediatrics and Human Development, College of Human Medicine, Michigan State University, Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA
| | - Lisa J. Schlueter
- Department of Pediatrics, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA
| | - Pat Levitt
- Department of Pediatrics, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA
| | - Charles A. Nelson
- Department of Pediatrics, Division of Developmental Medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
- Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
- Harvard Graduate School of Education, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
- Harvard Center on the Developing Child, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
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Juvrud J, Haas SA, Fox NA, Gredebäck G. Infants' Selective Visual Attention Is Dependent on Maternal Affect and Emotional Context. Front Psychol 2021; 12:700272. [PMID: 34603127 PMCID: PMC8481686 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.700272] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/25/2021] [Accepted: 08/12/2021] [Indexed: 11/28/2022] Open
Abstract
Development of selective attention during the first year of life is critical to cognitive and socio-emotional skills. It is also a period that the average child’s interactions with their mother dominate their social environment. This study examined how maternal negative affect and an emotion face prime (mother/stranger) jointly effect selective visual attention. Results from linear mixed-effects modeling showed that 9-month olds (N=70) were faster to find a visual search target after viewing a fearful face (regardless of familiarity) or their mother’s angry face. For mothers with high negative affect, infants’ attention was further impacted by fearful faces, resulting in faster search times. Face emotion interacted with mother’s negative affect, demonstrating a capacity to influence what infants attend in their environment.
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Affiliation(s)
- Joshua Juvrud
- Department of Psychology, Uppsala Child and Baby Lab, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Sara A Haas
- Department of Psychology, Uppsala Child and Baby Lab, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden.,Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, United States
| | - Nathan A Fox
- Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, United States
| | - Gustaf Gredebäck
- Department of Psychology, Uppsala Child and Baby Lab, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
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10
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Kataja EL, Rodrigues AJ, Scheinin NM, Nolvi S, Korja R, Häikiö T, Ekholm E, Sousa N, Karlsson L, Karlsson H. Prenatal Glucocorticoid-Exposed Infants Do Not Show an Age-Typical Fear Bias at 8 Months of Age - Preliminary Findings From the FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study. Front Psychol 2021; 12:655654. [PMID: 34393896 PMCID: PMC8356796 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.655654] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/31/2021] [Accepted: 06/29/2021] [Indexed: 11/17/2022] Open
Abstract
Synthetic glucocorticoids (sGC) are frequently administered to pregnant women at risk for preterm delivery to promote fetal lung maturation. Despite their undeniable beneficial effects in lung maturation, the impact of these hormones on developing brain is less clear. Recent human studies suggest that emotional and behavioral disorders are more common among sGC-exposed vs. non-exposed children, but the literature is sparse and controversial. We investigated if prenatal sGC exposure altered fear bias, a well-established infant attention phenotype, at 8-months. We used eye tracking and an overlap paradigm with control, neutral, happy, and fearful faces, and salient distractors, to evaluate infants’ attention disengagement from faces, and specifically from fearful vs. neutral and happy faces (i.e., a fear bias) in a sample (N = 363) of general population from the FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study. sGC exposed infants (N = 12) did not differ from non-exposed infants (N = 351) in their overall probability of disengagement in any single stimulus condition. However, in comparison with non-exposed infants, they did not show the age-typical fear bias and this association remained after controlling for confounding factors such as prematurity, gestational age at birth, birth weight, sex, and maternal postnatal depressive symptoms. Prenatal sGC exposure may alter emotional processing in infants. The atypical emotion processing in turn may be a predictor of emotional problems later in development. Future longitudinal studies are needed in order to evaluate the long-term consequences of sGC exposure for the developing brain.
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Affiliation(s)
- Eeva-Leena Kataja
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.,Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Ana João Rodrigues
- Life and Health Sciences Research Institute (ICVS), School of Medicine, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal
| | - Noora M Scheinin
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.,Department of Psychiatry, Turku University Hospital, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Saara Nolvi
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.,Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, Turku Institute for Advanced Studies, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.,Department of Medical Psychology, Corporate Member of Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin Institute of Health (BIH), Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Berlin, Germany
| | - Riikka Korja
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.,Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Tuomo Häikiö
- Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Eeva Ekholm
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.,Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Turku University Hospital, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Nuno Sousa
- Life and Health Sciences Research Institute (ICVS), School of Medicine, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal
| | - Linnea Karlsson
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.,Department of Psychiatry, Turku University Hospital, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.,Centre for Population Health Research, Turku University Hospital, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Hasse Karlsson
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.,Department of Psychiatry, Turku University Hospital, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.,Centre for Population Health Research, Turku University Hospital, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
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11
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Tuulari JJ, Kataja EL, Leppänen JM, Lewis JD, Nolvi S, Häikiö T, Lehtola SJ, Hashempour N, Saunavaara J, Scheinin NM, Korja R, Karlsson L, Karlsson H. Newborn left amygdala volume associates with attention disengagement from fearful faces at eight months. Dev Cogn Neurosci 2020; 45:100839. [PMID: 32836078 PMCID: PMC7451600 DOI: 10.1016/j.dcn.2020.100839] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/03/2019] [Revised: 06/26/2020] [Accepted: 08/12/2020] [Indexed: 02/09/2023] Open
Abstract
After 5 months of age, infants begin to prioritize attention to fearful over other facial expressions. One key proposition is that amygdala and related early-maturing subcortical network, is important for emergence of this attentional bias - however, empirical data to support these assertions are lacking. In this prospective longitudinal study, we measured amygdala volumes from MR images in 65 healthy neonates at 2-5 weeks of gestation corrected age and attention disengagement from fearful vs. non-fearful facial expressions at 8 months with eye tracking. Overall, infants were less likely to disengage from fearful than happy/neutral faces, demonstrating an age-typical bias for fear. Left, but not right, amygdala volume (corrected for intracranial volume) was positively associated with the likelihood of disengaging attention from fearful faces to a salient lateral distractor (r = .302, p = .014). No association was observed with the disengagement from neutral or happy faces in equivalent conditions (r = .166 and .125, p = .186 and .320, respectively). These results are the first to link the amygdala volume with the emerging perceptual vigilance for fearful faces during infancy. They suggest a link from the prenatally defined variability in the amygdala size to early postnatal emotional and social traits.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jetro J Tuulari
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Psychiatry, Turku University Hospital, University of Turku, Turku, Finland; Turku Collegium for Science and Medicine, University of Turku, Turku, Finland; Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, UK (Sigrid Juselius Fellowship), United Kingdom.
| | - Eeva-Leena Kataja
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Psychology, University of Turku, Finland; Infant Cognition Laboratory, Center for Child Health Research, School of Medicine, University of Tampere, Finland
| | - Jukka M Leppänen
- Infant Cognition Laboratory, Center for Child Health Research, School of Medicine, University of Tampere, Finland
| | - John D Lewis
- Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Canada
| | - Saara Nolvi
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Turku Institute for Advanced Studies, Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Tuomo Häikiö
- Department of Psychology, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Satu J Lehtola
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Niloofar Hashempour
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Jani Saunavaara
- Department of Medical Physics, Turku University Hospital, Turku, Finland
| | - Noora M Scheinin
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Psychiatry, Turku University Hospital, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Riikka Korja
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Psychology, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Linnea Karlsson
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Turku University Hospital and University of Turku, Department of Child Psychiatry, Finland; Centre for Population Health Research, University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Finland
| | - Hasse Karlsson
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Psychiatry, Turku University Hospital, University of Turku, Turku, Finland; Centre for Population Health Research, University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Finland
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12
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The role of TPH2 variant rs4570625 in shaping infant attention to social signals. Infant Behav Dev 2020; 60:101471. [PMID: 32711172 DOI: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2020.101471] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/28/2019] [Revised: 06/25/2020] [Accepted: 07/10/2020] [Indexed: 01/14/2023]
Abstract
TPH2, the rate-limiting enzyme in the synthesis of serotonin, has been connected to several psychiatric outcomes. Its allelic variant, rs4570625, has been found to relate to individual differences in cognitive and emotion regulation during infancy with T-carriers of rs4570625 showing a relatively heightened attention bias for fearful faces. A significant gene-environment interaction was also reported with the T-carriers of mothers with depressive symptoms showing the highest fear bias. We investigated these associations in a sample of 8-month old infants (N = 330), whose mothers were prescreened for low/high levels of prenatal depressive and/or anxiety symptoms. Attention disengagement from emotional faces (neutral, happy, fearful, and phase-scrambled control faces) to distractors was assessed with eye tracking and an overlap paradigm. Maternal depressive symptoms were assessed at several time points during pregnancy and postpartum. The mean levels of symptoms at six months postpartum and the trajectories of symptoms from early pregnancy until six months postpartum were used in the analyses (N = 274). No main effect of the rs4570625 genotype on attention disengagement was found. The difference in fear bias between the genotypes was significant but in an opposite direction compared to a previous study. The results regarding the interaction of the genotype and maternal depression were not in accordance with the previous studies. These results show inconsistencies in the effects of the rs4570625 genotype on attention biases in separate samples of infants from the same population with only slight differences in age.
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13
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Mustonen P, Karlsson L, Kataja EL, Scheinin NM, Kortesluoma S, Coimbra B, Rodrigues AJ, Sousa N, Karlsson H. Maternal prenatal hair cortisol is associated with prenatal depressive symptom trajectories. Psychoneuroendocrinology 2019; 109:104383. [PMID: 31400561 DOI: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2019.104383] [Citation(s) in RCA: 33] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/06/2019] [Revised: 07/17/2019] [Accepted: 07/17/2019] [Indexed: 11/15/2022]
Abstract
UNLABELLED Maternal prenatal cortisol levels have been inconsistently associated with self-reports of prenatal psychological distress (PD). Previous research has linked hair cortisol concentration (HCC) evaluating cumulatively the previous months with cross-sectional PD measures that usually cover the past week(s), which may lead to misleading conclusions on their relations. We aimed to investigate how maternal HCC relates to cumulative PD measures across pregnancy. METHODS Subjects (N = 595) were drawn from the FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study. Maternal HCC was measured from hair samples collected at gestational week (gwk) 24 (HCC1, n = 467) and at delivery (HCC2, n = 222). As HCC1 and HCC2 comprised mostly of different subjects, they were considered as independent populations. Maternal PD assessments at gwks 14, 24, and 34 were the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS), the anxiety subscale of the Symptom Checklist (SCL-90), the Pregnancy-Related Anxiety Questionnaire -Revised2 (PRAQ-R2), and a daily hassles scale. Cumulative PD comprised of the mean scores of two consecutive assessments (mean1 = gwks 14 and 24; mean2 = gwks 24 and 34). In addition, EPDS and SCL scores were modelled by using growth mixture modelling to identify symptom trajectory categories. Regression models were adjusted for age, body mass index, education and use of selective serotonin/serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor medication. RESULTS In the adjusted regression model, higher HCC2 was related to the "consistently elevated" prenatal depressive symptoms trajectory in comparison to "consistently low" (β =.71, p =.021) and "low and increasing" (β =.82, p = .011) symptom trajectories. Additionally, the cumulative mean (mean 1) of daily hassles in relationships was associated with HCC1 (β = 0.25, p = .004). General or pregnancy-related anxiety symptoms were unrelated to HCC after adjustment for the covariates. CONCLUSIONS The assessment of cumulative or trajectory measures of PD can reveal important associations with maternal prenatal HCC, even though the associations are generally weak. Of the different dimensions of PD, prenatal trajectories of depressive symptoms were most consistently linked with end-pregnancy HCC levels.
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Affiliation(s)
- Paula Mustonen
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Child Psychiatry, University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Turku, Finland.
| | - Linnea Karlsson
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Child Psychiatry, University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Turku, Finland
| | - Eeva-Leena Kataja
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Child Psychiatry, University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Turku, Finland
| | - Noora M Scheinin
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Psychiatry, University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Turku, Finland
| | - Susanna Kortesluoma
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Institute of Biomedicine, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Bárbara Coimbra
- Life and Health Sciences Research Institute (ICVS), School of Medicine, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal
| | - Ana João Rodrigues
- Life and Health Sciences Research Institute (ICVS), School of Medicine, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal
| | - Nuno Sousa
- Life and Health Sciences Research Institute (ICVS), School of Medicine, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal
| | - Hasse Karlsson
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Psychiatry, University of Turku and Turku University Hospital, Turku, Finland
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14
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Pyykkö J, Ashorn P, Ashorn U, Niehaus DJH, Leppänen JM. Cross-cultural analysis of attention disengagement times supports the dissociation of faces and patterns in the infant brain. Sci Rep 2019; 9:14414. [PMID: 31595014 PMCID: PMC6783433 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-019-51034-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/21/2019] [Accepted: 09/24/2019] [Indexed: 12/26/2022] Open
Abstract
Infants are slower to disengage from faces than non-face patterns when distracted by novel competing stimuli. While this perceptual predilection for faces is well documented, its universality and mechanisms in relation to other aspects of attention are poorly understood. We analysed attention disengagement times for faces and non-face patterns in a large sample of 6-to 9-month-old infants (N = 637), pooled from eye tracking studies in socioculturally diverse settings (Finland, Malawi, South Africa). Disengagement times were classified into distinct groups of quick and delayed/censored responses by unsupervised clustering. Delayed disengagement was frequent for faces (52.1% of trials), but almost negligible for patterns (3.9% of trials) in all populations. The magnitude of this attentional bias varied by individuals, whereas the impact of situational factors and facial expression was small. Individual variations in disengagement from faces were moderately stable within testing sessions and independent from variations in disengagement times for patterns. These results point to a fundamental dissociation of face and pattern processing in infants and demonstrate that the bias for faces can be robust against distractors and habituation. The results raise the possibility that attention to faces varies as an independent, early-emerging social trait in populations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Juha Pyykkö
- Center for Child Health Research, Faculty of Medicine and Health Technology, Tampere University, Tampere, Finland.
| | - Per Ashorn
- Center for Child Health Research, Faculty of Medicine and Health Technology, Tampere University, Tampere, Finland
- Department of Paediatrics, Tampere University Hospital, Tampere, Finland
| | - Ulla Ashorn
- Center for Child Health Research, Faculty of Medicine and Health Technology, Tampere University, Tampere, Finland
| | - Dana J H Niehaus
- Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Stellenbosch University, Cape Town, South Africa
| | - Jukka M Leppänen
- Infant Cognition Laboratory, Center for Child Health Research, Faculty of Medicine and Health Technology, Tampere University, Tampere, Finland
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15
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Nolvi S, Bridgett DJ, Korja R, Kataja EL, Junttila N, Karlsson H, Karlsson L. Trajectories of maternal pre- and postnatal anxiety and depressive symptoms and infant fear: Moderation by infant sex. J Affect Disord 2019; 257:589-597. [PMID: 31330484 DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2019.07.055] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/21/2019] [Revised: 05/05/2019] [Accepted: 07/04/2019] [Indexed: 12/15/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Prior work has examined the links between pre- and postnatal maternal distress and infant negative affectivity; however, there is little understanding about how the continuity of infant exposure to pre- and postnatal maternal distress relates to infant development. This study investigated the continuity of maternal pre- and postnatal depressive and anxiety symptoms and their relations with infant fear among 391 mother-infant dyads. An additional aim was to consider infant sex as a moderating factor. METHODS Maternal anxiety and depressive symptoms were measured during gestational weeks 14, 24 and 34 and 3 and 6 months postpartum. Subsequently, infant fear was measured using mother reports (IBQ-R) at 6 months and in a laboratory setting (Lab-TAB Masks episode) at 8 months. Using growth mixture modeling, a three-class model describing the course of maternal symptoms across pregnancy and the early postnatal period was identified, consisting of mothers with "Consistently Low Distress", "Prenatal-Only Distress", and "Consistently High Distress". RESULTS Infant girls exposed to prenatal-only maternal distress were higher in observed fear than infant boys exposed to prenatal-only distress. Infant girls exposed to consistently high distress also showed lower observed fear than their counterparts exposed to prenatal-only maternal distress. LIMITATIONS The main limitation of the study is the relatively small group size within the Consistently High subgroup. CONCLUSIONS The findings suggest that girls might be particularly sensitive to maternal distress, and that prenatal-only and continuous distress exposure are differentially related to female infant fear.
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Affiliation(s)
- Saara Nolvi
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, University of Turku, Turku, Finland; Department of Medical Psychology, Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, a corporate member of Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, and Berlin Institute of Health (BIH), Berlin, Germany..
| | - David J Bridgett
- Department of Psychology, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL, United States
| | - Riikka Korja
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, University of Turku, Turku, Finland; Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Eeva-Leena Kataja
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Niina Junttila
- Department of Teacher Education, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Hasse Karlsson
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, University of Turku, Turku, Finland; Department of Psychiatry, Turku University Hospital and University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Linnea Karlsson
- FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Department of Clinical Medicine, Turku Brain and Mind Center, University of Turku, Turku, Finland; Department of Child Psychiatry, Turku University Hospital and University of Turku, Turku, Finland
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16
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Kataja EL, Karlsson L, Parsons CE, Pelto J, Pesonen H, Häikiö T, Hyönä J, Nolvi S, Korja R, Karlsson H. Maternal pre- and postnatal anxiety symptoms and infant attention disengagement from emotional faces. J Affect Disord 2019; 243:280-289. [PMID: 30253357 DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2018.09.064] [Citation(s) in RCA: 22] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/13/2018] [Revised: 08/22/2018] [Accepted: 09/16/2018] [Indexed: 12/20/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Biases in socio-emotional attention may be early markers of risk for self-regulation difficulties and mental illness. We examined the associations between maternal pre- and postnatal anxiety symptoms and infant attention patterns to faces, with particular focus on attentional biases to threat, across male and female infants. METHODS A general population, Caucasian sample of eight-month old infants (N = 362) were tested using eye-tracking and an attention disengagement (overlap) paradigm, with happy, fearful, neutral, and phase-scrambled faces and distractors. Maternal self-reported anxiety symptoms were assessed with the Symptom Checklist-90/anxiety subscale at five time points between gestational week 14 and 6 months postpartum. RESULTS Probability of disengagement was lowest for fearful faces in the whole sample. Maternal pre- but not postnatal anxiety symptoms associated with higher threat bias in infants, and the relation between maternal anxiety symptoms in early pregnancy and higher threat bias in infants remained significant after controlling for maternal postnatal symptoms. Maternal postnatal anxiety symptoms, in turn, associated with higher overall probability of disengagement from faces to distractors, but the effects varied by child sex. LIMITATIONS The small number of mothers suffering from very severe symptoms. No control for the comorbidity of depressive symptoms. CONCLUSIONS Maternal prenatal anxiety symptoms associate with infant's heightened attention bias for threat. Maternal postnatal anxiety symptoms, in turn, associate with infant's overall disengagement probability differently for boys and girls. Boys may show enhanced vigilance for distractors, except when viewing fearful faces, and girls enhanced vigilance for all socio-emotional stimuli. Long-term implications of these findings remain to be explored.
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Affiliation(s)
- Eeva-Leena Kataja
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Psychology, University of Turku, Finland.
| | - Linnea Karlsson
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Child Psychiatry, Turku University Hospital and University of Turku, Finland
| | - Christine E Parsons
- Department of Clinical Medicine, Interacting Minds Center, Aarhus University, Denmark
| | - Juho Pelto
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Henri Pesonen
- Department of Computer Science, Aalto University, Finland
| | - Tuomo Häikiö
- Department of Psychology, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Jukka Hyönä
- Department of Psychology, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Saara Nolvi
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Riikka Korja
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Psychology, University of Turku, Finland
| | - Hasse Karlsson
- The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Finland; Department of Psychiatry, Turku University Hospital and University of Turku, Finland
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17
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Pyykkö J, Forssman L, Maleta K, Ashorn P, Ashorn U, Leppänen JM. Early development of visual attention in infants in rural Malawi. Dev Sci 2018; 22:e12761. [PMID: 30315673 DOI: 10.1111/desc.12761] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/01/2018] [Revised: 09/11/2018] [Accepted: 10/08/2018] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
Eye tracking research has shown that infants develop a repertoire of attentional capacities during the first year. The majority of studies examining the early development of attention comes from Western, high-resource countries. We examined visual attention in a heterogeneous sample of infants in rural Malawi (N = 312-376, depending on analysis). Infants were assessed with eye-tracking-based tests that targeted visual orienting, anticipatory looking, and attention to faces at 7 and 9 months. Consistent with prior research, infants exhibited active visual search for salient visual targets, anticipatory saccades to predictable events, and a robust attentional bias for happy and fearful faces. Individual variations in these processes had low to moderate odd-even split-half and test-retest reliability. There were no consistent associations between attention measures and gestational age, nutritional status, or characteristics of the rearing environment (i.e., maternal cognition, psychosocial well-being, socioeconomic status, and care practices). The results replicate infants' early attentional biases in a large, unique sample, and suggest that some of these biases (e.g., bias for faces) are pronounced in low-resource settings. The results provided no evidence that the initial manifestation of infants' attentional capacities is associated with risk factors that are common in low-resource environments.
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Affiliation(s)
- Juha Pyykkö
- Tampere Center for Child Health Research, Faculty of Medicine and Life Sciences, University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland
| | - Linda Forssman
- Department of Psychology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Kenneth Maleta
- Department of Public Health, School of Public Health and Family Medicine, College of Medicine, University of Malawi, Blantyre, Malawi
| | - Per Ashorn
- Tampere Center for Child Health Research, Faculty of Medicine and Life Sciences, University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland.,Department of Paediatrics, Tampere University Hospital, Tampere, Finland
| | - Ulla Ashorn
- Tampere Center for Child Health Research, Faculty of Medicine and Life Sciences, University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland
| | - Jukka M Leppänen
- Tampere Center for Child Health Research, Faculty of Medicine and Life Sciences, University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland
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