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Poster #22 - Parental Neural Response to Infant Emotional Expressions: Results of a Meta-Analysis

Fri, March 22, 2:30 to 3:45pm, Baltimore Convention Center, Floor: Level 1, Exhibit Hall B

Integrative Statement

A growing number of event-related potential (ERP) studies have examined parents’ neural responses to infant emotional expressions in order to understand the neurobiological mechanisms that may contribute to parenting behavior. Parental neural processing of infant distress cues is of particular interest, as attachment theory emphasizes parental responsiveness to infant distress as crucial for healthy child development (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978). ERP studies time lock the presentation of a stimulus to scalp-recorded voltage fluctuations, which allows researchers to examine stages of processing (i.e., early attention and perception; later sustained, controlled processing). More specifically, ERP studies investigating parental processing of infant emotional expressions frequently examine the early face-sensitive N170 component, which can be modulated by emotion, and the late positive potential (LPP) component, which reflects sustained attention to emotionally and motivationally relevant stimuli (Luck, 2014). However, the literature is mixed, with some evidence that parents show enhanced response to distress relative to positive or neutral expressions only at the N170 (e.g., Peltola, Strathearn, & Puura, 2018), only at the LPP (e.g., Malak, Crowley, Mayes, & Rutherford, 2015), or do not differentiate between emotional expressions at all (e.g., Noll, Mayes, & Rutherford, 2012). We conducted a series of meta-analyses in order to reconcile inconsistencies in the literature and determine to what extent N170 and LPP amplitudes to child faces are modulated by emotional expressions (crying vs. neutral, crying vs. laughing, laughing vs. neutral).
Studies were compiled in March 2018 through a systematic search of the electronic databases PubMed, PsycInfo, and Web of Science. Inclusion criteria included papers that 1) measured parents’ N170 and/or LPP responses to photographs of infant emotional expressions, 2) were written in English, and 3) were peer-reviewed. A total of 24 studies from 13 papers were included. For each ERP component, effect sizes (Cohen’s d) were calculated that reflected the magnitude of the within-subject difference in ERP amplitude between each pair of emotional expressions: crying-neutral (CN), crying-laughing (CL), and laughing-neutral (LN) at the N170 and LPP. Effect sizes were pooled using a random effects model.
Aggregate effect sizes were small yet significant for all three N170 comparisons (N170 CN: d = -0.12, p < 0.001; N170 CL: d = -.09, p < 0.001; N170 LN: d = -.08, p = 0.03), suggesting that parents showed enhanced (i.e., more negative) N170 responses to crying and laughing expressions relative to neutral expressions and enhanced N170 response to crying expressions relative to laughing expressions (See Figure 1). For the LPP, only the LPP CL effect size was significant (d = 0.13, p = 0.005), suggesting enhanced (i.e., more positive) LPP responses to crying relative to laughing expressions (See Figure 2).
Our findings indicate that parents differentiate most between infant emotional expressions at early stages of processing, with distress expressions eliciting a sustained, enhanced response. Early perception of infant emotions may facilitate parental responsiveness to infant nonverbal cues, and distress may require the most significant caregiving response. These findings are consistent with theories emphasizing the importance of parental attention to child distress.

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