TY  - JOUR
A1  - van der Kant, Anne
A1  - Biro, Szilvia
A1  - Levelt, Claartje
A1  - Huijbregts, Stephan
T1  - Negative affect is related to reduced differential neural responses to social and non-social stimuli in 5-to-8-month-old infants
BT  - a functional near-infrared spectroscopy-study
JF  - Developmental cognitive neuroscience : a journal for cognitive, affective and social developmental neuroscience
N2  - Both social perception and temperament in young infants have been related to social functioning later in life. Previous functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (fNIRS) data (Lloyd-Fox et al., 2009) showed larger blood-oxygenation changes for social compared to non-social stimuli in the posterior temporal cortex of five-month-old infants. We sought to replicate and extend these findings by using fNIRS to study the neural basis of social perception in relation to infant temperament (Negative Affect) in 37 five-to-eight-month-old infants. Infants watched short videos displaying either hand and facial movements of female actors (social dynamic condition) or moving toys and machinery (non-social dynamic condition), while fNIRS data were collected over temporal brain regions. Negative Affect was measured using the Infant Behavior Questionnaire. Results showed significantly larger blood-oxygenation changes in the right posterior-temporal region in the social compared to the non-social condition. Furthermore, this differential activation was smaller in infants showing higher Negative Affect. Our results replicate those of Lloyd-Fox et al. and confirmed that five-to-eight-month-old infants show cortical specialization for social perception. Furthermore, the decreased cortical sensitivity to social stimuli in infants showing high Negative Affect may be an early biomarker for later difficulties in social interaction.
KW  - Functional near-infrared spectroscopy
KW  - fNIRS
KW  - Social perception
KW  - Infants
KW  - Temperament
KW  - Negative affect
Y1  - 2018
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2017.12.003
SN  - 1878-9293
SN  - 1878-9307
VL  - 30
SP  - 23
EP  - 30
PB  - Elsevier
CY  - Oxford
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Adam, Maurits
A1  - Reitenbach, Ivanina
A1  - Elsner, Birgit
T1  - Agency cues and 11-month-olds’ and adults’ anticipation of action goals
JF  - Cognitive Development
N2  - For the processing of goal-directed actions, some accounts emphasize the importance of experience with the action or the agent. Other accounts stress the importance of agency cues. We investigated the impact of agency cues on 11-month-olds’ and adults’ goal anticipation for a grasping-action performed by a mechanical claw. With an eyetracker, we measured anticipations in two conditions, where the claw was displayed either with or without agency cues. In two experiments, 11-month-olds were predictive when agency cues were present, but reactive when no agency cues were presented. Adults were predictive in both conditions. Furthermore, 11-month-olds rapidly learned to predict the goal in the agency condition, but not in the mechanical condition. Adults’ predictions did not change across trials in the agency condition, but decelerated in the mechanical condition. Thus, agency cues and own action experience are important for infants’ and adults’ online processing of goal-directed actions by non-human agents.
KW  - Infants
KW  - Eyetracking
KW  - Action processing
KW  - Anticipatory gaze shifts
KW  - Agency
Y1  - 2017
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cogdev.2017.02.008
SN  - 0885-2014
SN  - 1879-226X
VL  - 43
SP  - 37
EP  - 48
PB  - Elsevier
CY  - New York
ER  -