Effects of a Video-Feedback Intervention to Promote Positive Parenting on Mothers’ Neural Processing of Children’s Facial Emotions

• In Event: 1-073 - The Neural Basis of Parenting: Event-Related Potentials and Maternal Behavior

Integrative Statement

A key factor of parental sensitivity is the recognition and accurate interpretation of children’s emotional signals, for example emotional facial expressions. The Video-feedback Intervention to promote Positive Parenting and Sensitive Discipline (VIPP-SD) has proven to be effective in enhancing parental sensitivity and sensitive discipline. The aim of the current study was to investigate VIPP-SD effects on mothers’ N170 amplitude in response to children’s facial expressions, expecting N170 amplitudes to be stronger as a result of the VIPP-SD. In a randomized controlled trial, 66 mothers came to Leiden University’s Child and Family lab for two identical experimental sessions separated by 4.6 months (SD = .93) during which a random 33% of the mothers received 5 sessions of the VIPP-SD. Mothers’ electroencephalographic (EEG) activity in response to 144 photographs (i.e. 48 happy, 48 angry and 48 neutral faces) was acquired during both pre- and post-intervention sessions. Compared to the control group, a RM-ANOVA showed that the N170 amplitudes were lower in the intervention group (F = 4.496, p = .038, partial η² = .067), which is in the opposite direction of our expectations. Suggested by the ERP waveform (Figure 1), we tested whether the intervention affected P1 amplitudes as that may have confounded our N170 results, but there was no significant effect on P1 amplitudes (F = 1.758, p = .190, partial η² = .027). Currently, we are working on P1-peak-to-N170-peak analyses and on the late positive potential (LPP), a component related to evaluation of emotional stimuli, to unravel VIPP-SD effects on neurocognitive processes. Furthermore, we collected data on parental sensitivity, therefore associations between N170, P1, LPP and parental sensitivity will be presented as well. Insight in these neurocognitive processes may reveal some of the mechanisms underlying the effects of successful parenting intervention programs on parenting behavior.

Authors

• Laura Kolijn, Leiden University
  Presenting Author

• Renske Huffmeijer, Leiden University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Bianca van den Bulk, Leiden University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Marinus H van IJzendoorn, Erasmus University Rotterdam
  Non-Presenting Author

• Marian J Bakermans-Kranenburg, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
  Non-Presenting Author