Journal
DEVELOPMENT AND PSYCHOPATHOLOGY
Volume -, Issue -, Pages -Publisher
CAMBRIDGE UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1017/S095457942100153X
Keywords
anxiety; arousal dysregulation; atypical regulation; parent-infant coregulation; parent-infant relationship
Categories
Funding
- ESRC [ES/N017560/1]
- ERC [ONACSA 853251]
- ESRC London Interdisciplinary Social Sciences Doctoral Training Partnership
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The study found that anxious caregivers are more likely to experience high physiological arousal when interacting with infants. They are also more likely to produce intense vocalizations during high arousal states. These intense vocalizations are associated with sustained increases in autonomic arousal for both anxious caregivers and their infants.
Co-regulation of physiological arousal within the caregiver-child dyad precedes later self-regulation within the individual. Despite the importance of unimpaired self-regulatory development for later adjustment outcomes, little is understood about how early co-regulatory processes can become dysregulated during early life. Aspects of caregiver behavior, such as patterns of anxious speech, may be one factor influencing infant arousal dysregulation. To address this, we made day-long, naturalistic biobehavioral recordings in home settings in caregiver-infant dyads using wearable autonomic devices and miniature microphones. We examined the association between arousal, vocalization intensity, and caregiver anxiety. We found that moments of high physiological arousal in infants were more likely to be accompanied by high caregiver arousal when caregivers had high self-reported trait anxiety. Anxious caregivers were also more likely to vocalize intensely at states of high arousal and produce intense vocalizations that occurred in clusters. High-intensity vocalizations were associated with more sustained increases in autonomic arousal for both anxious caregivers and their infants. Findings indicate that caregiver vocal behavior differs in anxious parents, cooccurs with dyadic arousal dysregulation, and could contribute to physiological arousal transmission. Implications for caregiver vocalization as an intervention target are discussed.
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