Deriving within-person estimates of delta-beta coupling: A novel measure for identifying individual differences in emotion and neural function in childhood.

Delta-beta coupling is increasingly used to understand early emotional development. However, little is known about the development of the coupling, limiting its utility for identifying normative or aberrant functioning. We used a prospective longitudinal sample (N = 122) to compare measures of within-person and between-person coupling between ages 3 and 5, track the developmental trajectory of coupling, identify individual differences in patterns of development, and explore emotion-related predictors and outcomes of discrete developmental patterns. Within-person measures, limited in overall utility, were most useful when (1) statistical approaches produced more homogenous groups within the overall sample (extreme groups or latent classes) or (2) the full developmental course was considered. We found two trajectories of change in frontal coupling and three trajectories of change in parietal coupling. Coupling trajectories were predicted by observed fear and approach/avoidance at age 3. In addition, high levels of frontal coupling at age 3 that declined and then levelled out through age 5 were associated with lower levels of internalizing by age 5. This work provides a foundation for understanding normative change in delta-beta coupling across the preschool years and useful insight for the use of this metric in future work.

Socioeconomic status moderates neural markers of cognitive reappraisal across preschool.

Emotion regulation (ER) is critical for children's healthy socio-emotional development, in part through its modulation of negative emotions that might otherwise place children at risk for psychopathology. The cognitive ER strategy of reappraisal appears to be particularly protective against the development of symptoms of anxiety and depression during childhood. Despite widespread acceptance of the benefits of reappraisal for children's long-term affective function, little is known about the developmental mechanisms that support emerging reappraisal in young children. Proximal mechanisms supporting reappraisal include biological processes; the modulation of reactivity to negative emotional stimuli is visible at the neural level through the Late Positive Potential (LPP). Influences on the developmental course of mechanisms like the LPP almost certainly include contextual factors, including quality of the environment, which have been largely ignored in work to date. The present study included a test of early (age 3-4) socioeconomic status (SES) as a moderator of children's reappraisal, evidenced by differences in the LPP to passive view and reappraisal conditions, at age 5. Results supported the presence of moderation. Reappraisal was visible as differences in LPP across conditions at high, but not low, levels of SES. Findings offer a foundation for delineating the development of reappraisal and understanding contexts that may promote preschoolers' reappraisal. Results also contribute to the delineation of the role of early psychophysiological markers in affective function and early risk for psychopathology.

Maternal symptoms of prenatal depression predict context-incongruent negative emotion in infants.

Prenatal symptoms of depression in mothers are associated with infants' emotional reactivity. Context-incongruent reactivity, comprising mismatches between the eliciting context and emotional reactions, predicts negative long-term socioemotional outcomes in children. However, the etiology of context-incongruent reactivity is largely unknown, obscuring a full understanding of its potential role as a vulnerability in models outlining the transmission of risk for emotion difficulties from mothers to offspring. We tested mothers' (N = 92) prenatal depressive symptoms as prospective predictors of infants' context-incongruent emotion. Greater prenatal symptoms predicted more context-incongruent negativity in infants even when controlling for context-congruent affect. Findings demonstrate a novel utility of context-incongruent emotion as one possible vulnerability linking mothers' prenatal depression to socioemotional difficulties in offspring. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Prenatal maternal depression predicts neural maturation and negative emotion in infants.

Despite widespread acceptance that prenatal symptoms of depression in mothers are detrimental to infants' long-term emotional and cognitive development, little is known about the mechanisms that may integrate outcomes across these domains. Rooted in the integrative perspective that emotional development is grounded in developing cognitive processes, we hypothesized that prenatal symptoms of depression in mothers would be associated with delays in neural maturation that support sociocognitive function in infants, leading to more problematic behaviors. We used a prospective longitudinal study of mothers (N = 92) and their infants to test whether self-reported symptoms of depression in mothers during the second and third trimesters were associated with neural development and infant outcomes at 4 months of age. While controlling for postpartum symptoms of depression, more prenatal symptoms of depression in mothers predicted less neural maturation in the parietal region of 4-month-old infants. Less neural maturation, in turn, was associated with greater infant negativity, suggesting neural maturation as a putative mechanism linking maternal symptoms of depression with infant outcomes. Differences in neural regions and developmental timing are also discussed.