Behavioral and Neural Synchrony in Infant-Parent Dyads During Interactive Play

• In Event: Poster Session 02
  In Poster Session: PS 02 Topic - Biological Processes: Neuroscience and Genetics

Abstract

There is a growing body of evidence that suggests that interpersonal synchrony, which includes reciprocal, temporal coordination of behavior, is an important predictor of successful social interaction and plays a key role in the acquisition of social cognition skills during the early years of life. There are many forms in which synchrony can be identified. Interbrain neural synchrony (IBS), the synchronization of two (or more) people’s neural systems during social interaction tasks, may play an important role. An emerging body of hyperscanning research using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) demonstrates interbrain synchrony (IBS) in the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), a core region in the Observation-Execution (OE) system. Further research has demonstrated that interpersonal motor synchrony can be identified in social communication interactions. Here, interpersonal motor synchrony refers to the phenomenon of coupling of physical behaviors between two individuals.

The aim of the current study was to examine whether infant-parent interactions in a naturalistic setting triggers a coupling within the IFG in infant-parent dyads. Additionally, we sought to examine the degree of interpersonal motor synchrony that occurs within infant-parent dyads during these naturalistic interactions. To this end, we have employed two validated behavioral tasks: a structured-play (Esteve-Gibert et al., 2017) and a free-play (Feldman, 2007) task. In both tasks, parent and infant were fitted with fNIRS headgear covering the temporal, occipital, and frontal regions. The participants sat facing each other. In the free-play task, parents were instructed to play with their infant as they typically do using a set of provided toys. In the structured-play task, parents were again instructed to play with their infant as they typically do, but to also share their interest with their infant in response to an event occurring at regular intervals over the duration of the task. Video was recorded during the interactions.

Using fNIRS hyperscanning, we assessed IBS in prefrontal brain areas of six typically developing infant-parent dyads during interactive play (mean infant age = 12m, 14d). Based on video-recordings of the tasks, we calculated interpersonal motor synchrony using motion energy analysis (MEA). In addition to determining the extent to which interpersonal motor synchrony was present, we were interested in the direction of the imitation: who was the leader and who was the follower. We found that in comparison to 264 shuffled dyads (random pairs), the 6 dyads showed greater zero-lag synchrony during free-play, whereas during structured-play infant-leading was more pronounced. These different patterns of interpersonal motor synchrony may be indicative of strategies used by infants to obtain more information about an event or occurrence when interacting with a parent. Moreover, in comparison to 30 shuffled dyads, IBS was higher in the left IFG and this coupling seems to be associated with behavioral findings, suggesting that IBS may potentially be mediating the interpersonal motor synchrony. These preliminary results contribute to our understanding of the neural and behavioural mechanisms underlying infant-parent interactions.

Authors

• Jacqueline Marie Stotler, Florida Atlantic University
  Presenting Author

• Mini Sharma
  Non-Presenting Author

• Itai Gutman, Ariel University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Naama Mayseless, Stanford University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Teresa Wilcox, Florida Atlantic University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Hila Gvirts, Ariel University
  Non-Presenting Author