EEG responses to infant faces in young adults can be influenced by the quality of early care experiences with caregivers.

BACKGROUND: The quality of early experiences with caregivers affects individual adjustment and can modulate adults' responses to salient social stimuli, like infant faces. However, in the framework of Interpersonal Acceptance-Rejection Theory (IPARTheory), no research to date has examined whether early experiences of acceptance or rejection from caregivers are associated with individual differences in the electrophysiological (EEG) responses to infant faces. OBJECTIVE: This study examined the associations between the perceived quality of care during childhood and the behavioral and EEG responses to infant and adult faces in non-parent young adults. METHODS: N = 60 non-parent young adults (30 males; 30 females) completed an Emotion Recognition task displaying emotional and unemotional infant and adult faces during an EEG recording. Memories of past care experiences with mothers and fathers were collected using the short form version of the Parental Acceptance-Rejection scale. RESULTS: At the behavioral level, slower Reaction Times (RTs) in recognizing all faces were related to higher levels of perceived maternal rejection in young adults; in particular, males who reported higher levels of maternal rejection displayed longer RTs in recognizing faces compared to females. At the neurophysiological level, as the level of perceived paternal rejection increased, the N170 amplitude to infant faces increased. Females who reported higher levels of paternal rejection, compared to males, had a larger increase in the N170 amplitude and a larger decrease in the LPP amplitude in response to emotional faces. CONCLUSIONS: While a higher perception of maternal rejection hindered the behavioral responses of adults in recognizing faces, those who felt more rejected by their own father during childhood showed an enhanced N170 amplitude to infant faces. This might reflect a greater need for discrimination resources, at a very early stage of infant face processing, in those adults who perceived higher levels of paternal rejection. Adults' sex modulated the associations found at the behavioral and neurophysiological levels. Overall, our findings extended the IPARTheory postulates that being neglected during childhood might trigger perceptual changes in adults, hindering the elaboration of social cues like infant and adult faces at different levels.

Neither Parents' Sex Nor the Type of Family Modulates Attentional Bias Toward Infant Faces: A Preliminary Study in Different-Sex and Same-Sex Parents.

An attentional bias toward infant versus adult faces has been detected in parents and positively associated with sensitive caregiving behaviors. In previous research, the attentional bias has been measured as the difference in attention, in terms of reaction times, captured by infant versus adult faces; the larger the difference, the greater the cognitive engagement that adults deployed to infant faces. However, research so far has been mostly confined to samples of mothers, who have been more represented than fathers. Moreover, new family forms, especially same-sex families of men, have been left out of research. To clarify potential sex differences and extend previous findings to diverse family forms, we implemented a modified Go/no-Go attentional task measuring attentional bias to infant faces in parents with children aged from 2 to 36 months. The sample (N = 86) was matched and included 22 fathers and 22 mothers from different-sex families and 20 fathers and 22 mothers from same-sex families. Overall, the results confirmed that infant faces induced a greater attentional bias compared to adult faces. Moreover, we found that neither the type of family nor parents' sex modulated the attentional bias toward infant faces. The findings are discussed in relation to the importance of understanding the correlates of parental response to infant cues going beyond a heteronormative perspective on parenting.

Attentional bias to infant faces might be associated with previous care experiences and involvement in childcare in same-sex mothers / El sesgo de atención hacia los rostros de los bebés podría estar asociado con experiencias de cuidado previas y la participación en el cuidado infantil en madres del mismo sexo

Background: Attentional bias toward infant faces is associated with parental sensitivity and supports the infant-caregiver attachment relationship, ultimately fostering child health outcomes. However, experience-related determinants of parents' attentional bias to infant faces have been poorly investigated. We examined attentional bias to infant versus adult faces in a sample of same-sex mothers (N = 76), and whether it varied depending on maternal involvement in childcare and the perceived quality of past experiences of care. Method: A Go/no-Go attentional task was used to compare the effects of infant and adult faces in retaining attention. Maternal involvement in childcare was measured using items addressing nurturing behaviors. Memories of past experiences of care were collected using the short-form version of the Parental Acceptance-Rejection scale. Results: Results confirmed that infant faces induced greater attentional bias compared to adult faces. More involved mothers were more biased, in terms of attention, to infant versus adult faces. Attentional bias to infant versus adult faces increased as mothers felt more rejected by their own fathers during childhood. Discussion: Our findings suggested that attentional bias to infant faces might be associated with past experiences of care and direct commitment in childcare in same-sex mothers. Robust and accurate empirical findings on same-sex parent families are essential to inform social policies supporting these families’ well being.(AU)

The perceived quality of maternal care during childhood shapes attentional bias to infant faces in parents and nonparents.

While research has shown that the attentional bias to infant faces predicts the quality of infant care, the antecedents of this cognitive process have been less established. In particular, it remains unknown whether the attentional bias to infant faces might be affected by the interplay between different factors, including memories of past experiences of care, adults' sex, and the experience of parenthood. To extend previous results, we examined the attentional bias to infant faces in a mixed sample of parents (n = 99) and nonparents (n = 102), and whether it varied in relation to parental status, sex, the quality of past experiences of care, and the interactions between these factors. A modified go/no-go task was used to compare the effect of adult and infant faces in retaining adults' attention. Memories of past experiences of paternal and maternal care were collected using the short form of the Italian version of the Parental Acceptance-Rejection scale. Results confirmed that infant faces induced greater attentional interference compared to adult faces. A heightened attention to all types of faces was found in parents versus nonparent. Women, as compared to men, were slower in the task performance, and allocated more attention to infant versus adult faces. Consistent with previous evidence, the attentional prioritization of infant faces varied in relation to previous experiences of care with one's own mother; individuals who remembered a more accepting maternal care allocated more attention to infant versus adult faces. Parental status did not modulate this effect, but sex of participants did. Grounded in the interpersonal acceptance-rejection theory (IPARTheory), this study provides new insights for discerning processes that might regulate global adult caregiving. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

The Role of Paternal Involvement on Behavioral Sensitive Responses and Neurobiological Activations in Fathers: A Systematic Review.

As fathering research has flourished, a growing body of studies has focused on behavioral and neurobiological mechanisms, respectively associated with caregiving sensitivity and responsiveness to infant stimuli. However, the association between these aspects and the key concept of paternal involvement in childcare (i.e., contribution in infant care in terms of time, availability, and responsibility) has been poorly investigated. The current work aims to systematically review the role of involvement in childcare on both neural activations and sensitive behaviors in fathers by examining (a) how paternal involvement has been measured and (b) whether paternal involvement has been associated with neurobiological activation and behavioral sensitive responses. Inclusion criteria were peer-reviewed quantitative studies, concerning fathers responding to infant stimuli at neurobiological or behavioral level, and including a quantitative measurement of paternal involvement in childcare. A quality rating for each study has been performed based on the measurements adopted to assess paternal involvement. Of 2,529 articles, 27 studies were included. According to our quality rating, 10 out of 27 studies included fairly good-standard measures for measuring paternal involvement, whereas 17 studies used good-standard measures. In addition, 11 studies provided details of paternal involvement in the context of neurobiological responses to infant stimuli, whereas 16 addressed paternal sensitive behaviors. Overall, only 8 studies reported relevant findings about the relationship between paternal involvement and neurobiological responses or sensitive behaviors in fathers. The present study is the first systematically evaluating the scope of paternal involvement in the field of Paternal Brain and fathers' sensitive responsiveness research. When high-standard measures are used, paternal involvement seems to play a significant role in modulating both the hormonal and the neural pathways associated with paternal behaviors. Remarkably, the role of paternal engagement may underpin an adaptive nurturance that is not dependent on pregnancy and childbirth but on caregiving experience. A promising positive link between paternal involvement and behavioral sensitivity may be expected in further studies, which will need to corroborate our conclusion by adopting detailed and appropriate measures assessing paternal involvement. As a future line of research, the inclusion of gay fathers may be beneficial for the field.

Attentional Prioritization of Infant Faces in Parents: The Influence of Parents' Experiences of Care.

Infant faces are prioritized by the attentional system in parents, resulting in a greater cognitive engagement in terms of response time. However, many biological, contextual and environmental factors relating to this cognitive mechanism have been left unexplored. To fill this gap, this study aims to (i) confirm that infant faces engage more attention compared to adult faces; (ii) investigate whether the attention to infant faces is affected early care experiences of parents; (iii) explore the effect of parents' sex by taking the amount of involvement with early childcare into consideration. 51 mothers and 46 fathers completed a modified Go/no-Go task, a brief sociodemographic questionnaire, the short version of the Adult Parental Acceptance-Rejection scale, and an ad-hoc question relating to the amount of parental involvement with early childcare. Parents' response times were slowed in the presence of infant versus adult faces. Parents whose mother was perceived as more sensitively accepting were more engaged by infant cues. By considering the amount of early parental involvement, the sex of parents did not significantly interact with the type of face. These findings provide new insights on the attention process in response to infant cues in parents and suggest that the investigation of experience-based factors may shed further light on this topic.