It takes two: Infants' moderate negative reactivity and maternal sensitivity predict self-regulation in the preschool years

Modeling the relationship between maternal health and infant behavioral characteristics based on machine learning

This study investigates the impact of maternal health on infant development by developing a mathematical model that delineates the relationship between maternal health indicators and infant behavioral characteristics and sleep quality. The main contributions of this study are as follows: (1) The use of Spearman's correlation coefficient to conduct correlation analysis and explore the main factors that influence infant behavioral characteristics based on maternal indicators. (2) The development of a combined model using machine learning techniques, including random forest (RF) and multilayer perceptron (MLP) to establish the relationship between maternal health (physical and psychological health) and infant behavioral characteristics. The model is trained and validated by the real data respectively. (3) The use of the Fuzzy C-means (FCM) dynamic clustering model to classify infant sleep quality. An RF regression model is constructed to predict infant sleep quality using maternal indicators. This study is significant in gaining a deeper understanding of the relationship between maternal health indicators and infant development, and provides a basis for future intervention measures.

Annual Research Review: 'There, the dance is - at the still point of the turning world' - dynamic systems perspectives on coregulation and dysregulation during early development

During development we transition from coregulation (where regulatory processes are shared between child and caregiver) to self-regulation. Most early coregulatory interactions aim to manage fluctuations in the infant's arousal and alertness; but over time, coregulatory processes become progressively elaborated to encompass other functions such as sociocommunicative development, attention and executive control. The fundamental aim of coregulation is to help maintain an optimal 'critical state' between hypo- and hyperactivity. Here, we present a dynamic framework for understanding child-caregiver coregulatory interactions in the context of psychopathology. Early coregulatory processes involve both passive entrainment, through which a child's state entrains to the caregiver's, and active contingent responsiveness, through which the caregiver changes their behaviour in response to behaviours from the child. Similar principles, of interactive but asymmetric contingency, drive joint attention and the maintenance of epistemic states as well as arousal/alertness, emotion regulation and sociocommunicative development. We describe three ways in which active child-caregiver regulation can develop atypically, in conditions such as Autism, ADHD, anxiety and depression. The most well-known of these is insufficient contingent responsiveness, leading to reduced synchrony, which has been shown across a range of modalities in different disorders, and which is the target of most current interventions. We also present evidence that excessive contingent responsiveness and excessive synchrony can develop in some circumstances. And we show that positive feedback interactions can develop, which are contingent but mutually amplificatory child-caregiver interactions that drive the child further from their critical state. We discuss implications of these findings for future intervention research, and directions for future work.

The role of perinatal maternal symptoms of depression, anxiety and pregnancy-specific anxiety for infant's self-regulation: A prospective longitudinal study

BACKGROUND

Maternal symptoms of anxiety and depression are highly prevalent during pregnancy and postpartum and have the potential to impact fetal development and offspring behavior. However, research on the effects of fetal exposure to maternal subclinical affective symptoms on infant self-regulation is still lacking. Self-regulation provides a fundamental precondition for healthy development and overall life success whereas dysfunctional self-regulation can lead to behavioral problems, poor academic achievement, social rejection, and physical/mental disorders. During pregnancy and infancy, children largely depend upon their mothers in order to successfully regulate their internal states. Given the high prevalence of mothers suffering from anxiety and depressive symptoms during pregnancy and after childbirth, the aim of the present study is to explore how maternal affective symptoms change during the pre- and postnatal period, and how measures obtained in pregnancy and beyond impact self-regulation in infants, as indicated by crying-, sleeping-, and/or feeding problems.

METHODS

This prospective longitudinal study investigates the effects of maternal symptoms of depression, anxiety, and pregnancy-specific anxiety on infant's self-regulation in N = 225 mother-infant dyads. Maternal affective symptoms were examined at five prenatal and three postnatal time-points using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS), the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) and the Pregnancy Related Anxiety Questionnaire Revised (PRAQ-R2). Infant's self-regulation was assessed twice - at the age of three and six months - using the Crying Feeding Sleeping Scale (SFS).

RESULTS

Maternal pregnancy-specific anxiety was the most significant predictor for infant self-regulatory problems. It predicted crying-, sleeping, and feeding problems and explained up to 18 % of the variance. Even when controlling for maternal postpartum affective symptoms, pregnancy-specific anxiety remained a significant predictor for infant self-regulation problems.

LIMITATIONS

Rather homogenous sample (high socioeconomic status). Data based on maternal reports of infant behavior.

CONCLUSIONS

Our results suggest that fetal exposure to maternal affective symptoms - specifically pregnancy-related anxiety - plays a substantial role in the development of infant self-regulation problems, potentially mediated by epigenetic modifications. Importantly, even though maternal symptoms of depression and anxiety only reached subclinical levels, they were predictive for infant crying-, sleeping-, and feeding problems. Our findings underline the importance of early prevention and clearly tailored interventions during pregnancy and postpartum to prevent adverse outcome for mother, child and family.

Associations among maternal lifetime trauma, psychological symptoms in pregnancy, and infant stress reactivity and regulation

Maternal trauma has intergenerational implications, including worse birth outcomes, altered brain morphology, and poorer mental health. Research investigating intergenerational effects of maternal trauma on infant stress reactivity and regulation is limited. Maternal mental health during pregnancy may be a contributor: psychopathology is a sequela of trauma exposure and predictor of altered self-regulatory capacity in offspring of affected mothers. We assessed associations among maternal lifetime trauma and infant stress responsivity, mediated by psychological symptoms in pregnancy. Mothers reported lifetime trauma history and anxiety, depressive, and posttraumatic stress symptoms during pregnancy. At infant age 6 months, stress reactivity and regulation were assessed via maternal behavior ratings (Infant Behavior Questionnaire-Revised, IBQ-R) and behavioral (negative mood) and physiological (respiratory sinus arrhythmia, RSA) markers during a laboratory stressor (Still-Face Paradigm). Maternal trauma was directly associated with lower infant physiological regulation and indirectly associated with lower levels of both infant behavioral and physiological regulation via higher maternal anxiety during pregnancy. Maternal trauma was also indirectly associated with higher infant reactivity via higher maternal anxiety during pregnancy. Post hoc analyses indicated differential contributions of maternal prenatal versus postnatal anxiety to infant outcomes. Findings highlight potential contributory mechanisms toward maladaptive child stress response, which has been associated with poor behavioral, cognitive, and academic outcomes.

A dynamic systems perspective towards executive function development: Susceptibility at both ends for inhibitory control

In light of the dynamic systems perspective, the current study expanded existing literature by examining the moderating effect of maternal sensitivity on the quadratic association between infant negative reactivity and future executive function development. Using a longitudinal, multimethod design, we addressed executive function development among preschoolers. This study utilized data from the Family Life Project (N = 1292). Infant negative reactivity at 6 months, maternal sensitivity across first 3 years, and executive functions during preschool age were observational assessed. A path model with moderation analyses revealed a U-shaped quadratic association between infant negative reactivity and preschoolers' inhibitory control, only when maternal sensitivity was high. The results suggest that maternal sensitivity may assist infants with both low and high, but not moderate, levels of negative reactivity towards better executive function development. Findings support the ongoing nonlinear person-environment interplay during early years of life.

Crying in the first 12 months of life: A systematic review and meta-analysis of cross-country parent-reported data and modeling of the "cry curve"

Crying is an ubiquitous communicative signal in infancy. This meta-analysis synthesizes data on parent-reported infant cry durations from 17 countries and 57 studies until infant age 12 months (N = 7580, 54% female from k = 44; majority White samples, where reported, k = 18), from studies before the end Sept. 2020. Most studies were conducted in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada (k = 32), and at the traditional cry "peak" (age 5-6 weeks), where the pooled estimate for cry and fuss duration was 126 mins (SD = 61), with high heterogeneity. Formal modeling of the meta-analytic data suggests that the duration of crying remains substantial in the first year of life, after an initial decline.

Acute Maternal Stress Disrupts Infant Regulation of the Autonomic Nervous System and Behavior: A CASP Study

Exposure to maternal stress is assumed to influence infant health and development across the lifespan. The autonomic nervous system (ANS) is especially sensitive to the effects of the early caregiving environment and linked to predictors of later mental health. Understanding how exposure to maternal stress adversely affects the developing ANS could inform prevention. However, there is no agreed upon definition of maternal stress making its study difficult. Here we use the Caretaker Acute Stress Paradigm (CASP) to study the effects of maternal stress in an experimentally controlled laboratory setting. The CASP has 5 episodes, a natural play, followed by a caretaker stressor (or control) condition, another play, a classic still face episode, followed by another play. A total of 104 4-months-old infants and their mothers were randomly assigned to either the caretaker-stress or caretaker-control condition. Changes in behavior, heart rate (HR), and respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) before and after the introduction of the stressor (or control condition) were recorded and compared. Infants in the maternal stress condition showed significantly more behavioral distress [X 2 = (1, N = 104) = 4.662, p = 0.031]. Moreover, infants whose mothers were in the stress condition showed an significant increase in heart rate after the caretaker condition [F (1, 102) = 9.81, p = 0.002]. Finally we observed a trend to faster RSA recovery in infants of the control condition [F (1, 75) = 3.539, p = 0.064]. Results indicate that exposure to acute maternal stress affects infant regulation of the autonomic nervous system and behavior.