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Facial expressions and EEG in infants of intrusive and withdrawn mothers with depressive symptoms
Author(s) -
Diego Miguel A.,
Field Tiffany,
Hart Sybil,
HernandezReif Maria,
Jones Nancy,
Cullen Christy,
Schanberg Saul,
Kuhn Cynthia
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
depression and anxiety
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.634
H-Index - 129
eISSN - 1520-6394
pISSN - 1091-4269
DOI - 10.1002/da.1079
Subject(s) - facial expression , psychology , surprise , electroencephalography , audiology , developmental psychology , depressive symptoms , clinical psychology , psychiatry , medicine , anxiety , communication
When intrusive and withdrawn mothers with depressive symptoms modeled happy, surprised, and sad expressions, their 3‐month‐old infants did not differentially respond to these expressions or show EEG changes. When a stranger modeled these expressions, the infants of intrusive vs. withdrawn mothers looked more at the surprised and sad expressions and showed greater relative right EEG activity in response to the surprise and sad expressions as compared to the happy expressions. These findings suggest that the infants of intrusive mothers with depressive symptoms showed more differential responding to the facial expressions than the infants of withdrawn mothers. In addition, the infants of intrusive vs. infants of withdrawn mothers showed increased salivary cortisol following the interactions, suggesting that they were more stressed by the interactions. Depression and Anxiety 15:10–17, 2002. © 2002 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.