Physiological Synchrony Among Primiparous Parents as a Predictor of Couple Relationship Quality, Parenting, and Child Outcomes

• In Event: 1-083 - A Basic and Applied Understanding of the Bidirectional Links Between Parents’ Emotions and Child Well-being

Integrative Statement

Physiological coregulation is widely regarded as an important feature of attachment relationships. Optimal coregulation occurs when partners help to down-regulate each other’s aversive physiological arousal (Sbarra & Hazan, 2008), whereas synchronous increases in physiological arousal portends negative outcomes in couples (Levenson & Gottman, 1983). To date, physiological synchrony has not been examined among couples during the transition to parenthood. However, during this is a time of great physiological changes in response to prenatal stress, shifting roles/identities, relationship conflict, and other daily stressors, such as sleeplessness (Doss & Rhoades, 2017); thus, it may be important to examine physiological synchrony during this developmental window. Indeed, patterns of coregulation during pregnancy hold the potential to exert cascading impacts on couple relationships, parenting and children across development. The goal of this study is to conduct the first examination of physiological synchrony in couples embarking upon the transition to parenthood.

To assess physiological synchrony comprehensively, this study examines synchrony of salivary alpha-amylase (sAA; a surrogate marker of autonomic nervous system activity), cortisol (glucocorticoid marker of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activation), and testosterone (a steroid hormone biomarker of hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal axis activity). Primiparous women and their male partners (N = 89 dyads) participated in this longitudinal study. At the prenatal assessment, couples completed a standardized stressor task in which one member of the dyad (randomly selected) interacted with a crying, inconsolable, doll and then reunited with the partner. Saliva was collected before and after the stressor task; samples were subsequently assayed for cortisol, testosterone, and sAA. Couples completed measures of relationship satisfaction, parenting satisfaction, and parenting behavior at the prenatal visit, 3 months, and 24 months postpartum. Infants completed standardized behavioral tasks at 24 months of age to assess effortful control. We aimed to 1) assess whether couples show synchrony in pre-stressor or post-stressor biomarker levels, and 2) to examine whether degree of synchrony of changes in biomarkers across the stressor are concurrently and prospectively associated with couple, parent, and child outcomes.

Across the sample, as a whole, couples’ sAA and testosterone were not significantly associated. However, male and female partners’ pre- and post-stressor cortisol levels bore significant quadratic and cubic associations with one another (see Table 1). Polynomial hierarchical regressions revealed that cortisol and sAA synchrony were not consistently associated with relationship factors. However, greater synchrony in testosterone increases from pre- to post-stressor were consistently associated with negative outcomes: 1) Couple: reported lower satisfaction in the couple relationship and lower perceptions of partner social support; 2) Parent: poorer emotion regulation in the parenting role, less authoritarian parenting; 3) Child: poorer effortful control in 24 month-old infants (see Fig.1).

Findings suggest that couples show significant positive linkage (synchrony) in cortisol but not sAA or testosterone. Of the three biomarkers examined, testosterone synchrony was most reliably associated with relationship factors, resonating with findings suggesting that coactivation of aggression is detrimental in couples. Likewise, these findings suggest that synchrony of testosterone activation is associated with negative family outcomes, which we discuss in terms of understanding of physiological coregulation.
 

Authors

• Jessica Borelli, University of California, Irvine
  Presenting Author

• Douglas Granger, University of California, Irvine
  Non-Presenting Author

• Laurel Benjamin, University of California, Irvine
  Non-Presenting Author

• Nicole M. Froidevaux, University of California, Irvine
  Non-Presenting Author

• Dana Shai, The Academic College of Tel-Aviv-Yaffo
  Non-Presenting Author