Facial expressivity and vagal tone in 5- and 10-month-old infants☆
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Cited by (109)
Relations between infant sleep quality, physiological reactivity, and emotional reactivity to stress at 3 and 6 months
2022, Infant Behavior and DevelopmentChildren with developmental dyslexia show elevated parasympathetic nervous system activity at rest and greater cardiac deceleration during an empathy task
2021, Biological PsychologyCitation Excerpt :Heart rate variability measures taken at rest, including RSA, have also been associated with performance in multiple cognitive and affective domains, with higher heart rate variability relating to flexible, adaptive responding as well as a host of social and emotional advantages from the earliest days of life (Beauchaine, 2001). In infants and children, higher resting heart rate variability is associated with greater active engagement with the environment (Richards & Cameron, 1989), enhanced sustained attention (Suess, Porges, & Plude, 1994), and higher emotional reactivity (Stifter, Fox, & Porges, 1989). Whereas children and adolescents with behavioral and social disturbances often have lower resting heart rate variability (Condy, Scarpa, & Friedman, 2017; Eisenberg et al., 2012; Pine et al., 1996), those with higher resting heart rate variability show greater facial expressions of concern in response to others in distress (Fabes, Eisenberg, & Eisenbud, 1993) as well as greater dispositional helpfulness (Fabes et al., 1993), sympathy (Taylor, Eisenberg, & Spinrad, 2015), and prosocial tendencies (Fabes, Eisenberg, Karbon, Troyer, & Switzer, 1994; Miller, Kahle, & Hastings, 2015).
Characterizing change in vagal tone during the first three years of life: A systematic review and empirical examination across two longitudinal samples
2021, Neuroscience and Biobehavioral ReviewsCitation Excerpt :Across studies with multiple measures of vagal tone, comparing mean values of RSA typically revealed higher levels of vagal tone as a function of age. Thus vagal tone has been found to be higher at earlier months as compared to later months across infancy (Jewell et al., 2018; Bornstein and Suess, 2000; Gueron-Sela et al., 2017; Porter et al., 1995; Fracasso et al., 1994; Bar-Haim et al., 2000; Perry et al., 2018; Stifter et al., 1989; Whedon et al., 2018; Alkon et al., 2006, 2011; Jewell et al., 2018, toddlerhood (Izard et al., 1991; Fox, 1989; Berry et al., 2018; Gueron-Sela et al., 2017; Jewell et al., 2018; Stifter and Jain, 1996; Gueron-Sela et al., 2017; Jewell et al., 2018; Berry et al., 2018; Perry et al., 2018; Whedon et al., 2016, 2018), and early childhood (Gueron-Sela et al., 2017; Esposito et al., 2016; Berry et al., 2018; Porges et al., 1994; Esposito et al., 2016; Bar-Haim et al., 2000; Calkins and Keane, 2004; Kennedy et al., 2004; Bornstein & Suess, 2000). A parallel trend towards increasing values of RSA with age was revealed by plotting the weighted means of RSA across studies (see Fig. 2).
Trajectories of behavioral avoidance in real time: Associations with temperament and physiological dysregulation in preschoolers
2021, Journal of Experimental Child PsychologyCitation Excerpt :Polyvagal Theory suggests that RSA reflects self-regulatory capacity by providing us with information about the body’s capacity for flexibly responding to environmental challenges through parasympathetic influences on the heart (Porges, 2007). Although high levels of baseline RSA have been used as an indicator of dispositional self-regulation (e.g., Geisler, Kubiak, Siewert, & Weber, 2013; Stifter, Fox, & Porges, 1989), RSA suppression during environmental challenges may be a more appropriate measure of in-the-moment, context-specific self-regulatory capacity than other measures, because it reflects the bodies regulatory response to specific environmental challenges (Beauchaine, 2001; Porges, 2007). RSA suppression has been positively associated with sociability (Fox, 1989) and bold, approach-related behaviors in the presence of a stranger (Brooker & Buss, 2010) in childhood.
Development of cardiac autonomic balance in infancy and early childhood: A possible pathway to mental and physical health outcomes
2018, Developmental ReviewCitation Excerpt :These contradictory findings underscore functional differences between PEP and LF-HRV, which appear to diverge as the SNS matures and its functions differentiate. Studies of single-branch functioning provide a more fine-grained look at PNS maturation, suggesting that resting PNS tone increases from three to nine or 10 months (Bar-Haim et al., 2000; Schechtman et al., 1989; Stifter, Fox, & Porges, 1989) and, less steeply, to ages two (Bar-Haim et al., 2000; Patriquin, Lorenzi, Scarpa, & Bell, 2014) and five, when levels of resting PNS tone are indistinguishable from adult levels (Bornstein & Suess, 2000). Taken together, these concurrent maturational trajectories of resting SNS and PNS tones suggest that profiles of CAB may normatively shift from high-SNS/low-PNS in gestation to increasingly low-SNS/high-PNS across infancy and early childhood, co-developing with expanding regulatory capacities.
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This research was supported, in part, by a National Science Foundation grant (BNS#874229) and a National Institutes of Health grant (HD#17899) awarded to Nathan A. Fox and by a National Institute of Health grant (HD#22628) awarded to Stephen W. Porges.