Infant emotional responses to challenge predict empathic behavior in toddlerhood.
Dev Psychobiol
; 62(4): 454-470, 2020 05.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-31489632
ABSTRACT
Although emotional responses are theorized to be important in the development of empathy, findings regarding the prediction of early empathic behavior by infant behavioral and physiological responses are mixed. This study examined whether behavioral and physiological responses to mild emotional challenge (still face paradigm and car seat task) in 118 infants at age 6 months predicted empathic distress and empathic concern in response to an empathy-evoking task (i.e, experimenter's distress simulation) at age 20 months. Correlation analyses, corrected for sex and baseline levels of physiological arousal, showed that stronger physiological and behavioral responses to emotional challenge at age 6 months were positively related to observed empathic distress, but not empathic concern, at age 20 months. Linear regression analyses indicated that physiological and behavioral responses to challenge at 6 months independently predicted empathic distress at 20 months, which suggests an important role for both physiological and behavioral emotional responses in empathy development. In addition, curvilinear regression analyses showed quadratic associations between behavioral responses at 6 months, and empathic distress and empathic concern at 20 months, which indicates that moderate levels of behavioral responsivity predict the highest levels of empathic distress and empathic concern.
Palavras-chave
Texto completo:
1
Coleções:
01-internacional
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Sistema Nervoso Autônomo
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Desenvolvimento Infantil
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Comportamento do Lactente
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Emoções
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Empatia
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Arritmia Sinusal Respiratória
Tipo de estudo:
Observational_studies
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Prognostic_studies
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Risk_factors_studies
Limite:
Female
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Humans
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Infant
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Male
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Dev Psychobiol
Ano de publicação:
2020
Tipo de documento:
Article
País de afiliação:
Holanda