Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-24hb2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-28T07:43:08.177Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Infant and maternal behavior moderate reactivity to novelty to predict anxious behavior at 2.5 years

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 February 2006

SUSAN C. CROCKENBERG
Affiliation:
University of Vermont
ESTHER M. LEERKES
Affiliation:
University of North Carolina at Greensboro

Abstract

The degree to which infant regulatory behaviors, together with infant reactivity to novelty, predicted anxious behavior at 2.5 years, and the moderating effect of maternal behavior were tested. Sixty-four low-risk mothers and infants participated. Mothers rated infant negative reactivity and anxious behavior; infant and maternal behaviors were observed at 6 months postpartum. Based on results of hierarchical, multiple regressions, infant regulatory behaviors (i.e., attention control, withdrawal) moderated associations between reactivity to novelty and later anxious behavior, but predictions depended also on maternal behavior. High reactivity to novelty, in conjunction with withdrawal and with poor attention control, predicted anxious behavior only when mothers were less engaged or less sensitive, suggesting that maternal behavior alters developmental trajectories associated with infant temperament.We are grateful to participating families; the Visiting Nurse Association, Beginnings, and Primetime for help recruiting; David Howell and Roger Bakeman for help with data analysis; James Long for his technical assistance; Emma Burrous for help developing and applying coding schemes. We are also grateful to these undergraduates and volunteers: Kerry Modry, David Centerbar, Julie Mulhern, Amanda Werner, Regina Miller, Jeannine Pablo, Maya Carlet, Samantha Thomas, Kerstin Grieshaber, Erica Hendalion, Amanda Heldt, Allyson Stern, Lisa Badanes, Lynne Babchuck, Emily Vilardo, Heather Kline, Michelle Clancy, Gina Berrera, and Shamila Lekka.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
© 2006 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Achenbach, T. M. (1992). Manual for the Child Behavior Checklist/2–3 and 1992 profile. Burlington, VT: University of Vermont, Department of Psychiatry.
Aiken, L., & West, S. (1991). Multiple regression: Testing and interpreting interactions. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
Arcus, D. (2001). Inhibited and uninhibited children: Biology in the social context. In T. Wachs & G. A. Kohnstamm (Eds.), Temperament in context (pp. 4360). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Axia, G., Bonichini, S., & Benini, F. (1999). Attention and reaction to distress in infancy: A longitudinal study. Developmental Psychology, 35, 500504.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buss, K. A., & Goldsmith, H. H. (1998). Fear and anger regulation in infancy: Effects on the temporal dynamics of affective expression. Child Development, 69, 359374.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buss, K. A., Schumacher, J. R., Dolski, I., Kalin, N. H., Goldsmith, H. H., & Davidson, R. J. (2003). Right frontal brain activity, cortisol, and withdrawal behavior in 6-month-old infants. Behavioral Neuroscience, 117, 1120.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Calkins, S. D., & Fox, N. A. (1994). Individual differences in the biological aspects of temperament. In J. Bates & T. Wachs (Eds.), Temperament: Individual differences at the interface of biology and behavior. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Calkins, S. D., Fox, N. A., & Marshall, T. R. (1996). Behavioral and physiological antecedents of inhibited and uninhibited behavior. Child Development, 67, 523540.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cole, P. M., Martin, S. E., & Dennis, T. A. (2004). Emotion regulation as a scientific construct: Methodological challenges and directions for child development research. Child Development, 75, 317333.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crockenberg, S. C., & Leerkes, E. M. (2004). Infant and maternal behaviors regulate infant reactivity to novelty at six months. Developmental Psychology, 40, 11231132.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davidson, R. J., & Rickman, M. (1999). Behavioral inhibition and the emotional circuitry of the brain: Stability and plasticity during the early childhood years. In L. A. Schmidt & J. Schulkin (Eds.), Extreme fear, shyness, and social phobia: Origins, biological mechanisms, and clinical outcomes. Series in affective science (pp. 6787). New York: Oxford University Press.
Farran, D., Kasari, C., Comfort, M., & Jay, S. (1986). The Parent/Caregiver Involvement Scale training manual. Chapel Hill, NC: Frank Porter Graham Child Development Center.
Feldman, R., Greenbaum, C., & Yirmiya, N. (1999). Mother–infant affect synchrony as an antecedent of the emergence of self-control. Developmental Psychology, 35, 223231.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fox, N. A., Henderson, K. H., Rubin, K. H., Calkins, S. D., & Schmidt, L. A. (2001). Continuity and discontinuity of behavioral inhibition and exuberance: Psychophysiological and behavioral influences across the first years of life. Child Development, 72, 121.Google Scholar
Goldsmith, H. H., Rieser-Danner, L. A., & Briggs, S. (1991). Evaluating convergent and discriminant validity of temperament questionnaires for preschoolers, toddlers, and infants. Developmental Psychology, 27, 566579.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haley, D., & Stansbury, K. (2003). Infant stress and parent responsiveness: Regulation of physiology and behavior during still-face and reunion. Child Development, 74, 15341546.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harris, R. J. (1985). A primer of multivariate statistics (2nd ed.). New York: Academic Press.
Jahromi, L. B., Putnam, S. P., & Stifter, C. A. (2004). Maternal regulation of infant reactivity from 2 to 6 months. Developmental Psychology, 40, 477487.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johnson, M. H., Posner, M. I., & Rothbart, M. K. (1991). Components of visual orienting in early infancy: Contingency learning, anticipatory looking, and disengaging. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 4, 335344.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kagan, J., & Snidman, N. (1991). Infant predictors of inhibited and uninhibited behavior profiles. Psychological Sciences, 2, 4044.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kagan, J., Snidman, N., Arcus, D., & Reznick, J. S. (1994). Galen's prophecy: Temperament in human nature. New York: Basic Books.
Kagan, J., Snidman, N., Zentner, M., & Peterson, E. (1999). Infant temperament and anxious symptoms in school age children. Development and Psychopathology, 11, 209224.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Karrass, J., & Braungart-Rieker, J. M. (2004). Infant negative emotionality and attachment: Implications for preschool intelligence. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 28, 221229.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kochanska, G., Murray, K. T., & Harlan, E. T. (2000). Effortful control in early childhood: Continuity and change, antecedents, and implications for social development. Developmental Psychology, 36, 220232.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leerkes, E. M., & Crockenberg, S. C. (2003). The impact of maternal characteristics and sensitivity on the concordance between maternal reports and laboratory observations of infant negative emotionality. Infancy, 4, 517539.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leerkes, E., Burrous, E., & Crockenberg, S. (2004). Identifying components of maternal sensitivity to infant distress: The role of maternal emotional competencies. Parenting: Science and Practice, 4, 123.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lerner, J. V., Nitz, K., Talwar, R., & Lerner, R. M. (1989). On the functional significance of temperamental individuality: A developmental contextual view of the concept of goodness of fit. In G. A Kohnstamm, J. E. Bates, & M. K. Rothbart (Eds.) Temperament in childhood. West Sussex: Wiley.
Long, J. (1999). Video coding system: Reference guide. Caroga Lake, NY: James Long Company.
Mangelsdorf, S., McHale, J., Diener, M., Goldstein, L., & Lehn, L. (2000). Infant attachment: Contributions of infant temperament and maternal characteristics. Infant Behavior and Development, 23, 175196.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mebert, C. J. (1991). Dimensions of subjectivity in parents' ratings of infant temperament. Child Development, 61, 352361.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moore, G. A., Cohn, J. F., & Campbell, S. B. (2001). Infant affective responses to mother's still face at 6 months differentially predict externalizing and internalizing behaviors at 18 months. Developmental Psychology, 37, 706714.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nachmias, M., Gunnar, M., Mangelsdorf, S., Parritz, R. H., & Buss, K. (1996). Behavioral inhibition and stress reactivity: The moderating role of attachment security. Child Development, 67, 508522.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ollendick, T., & Hirshfeld-Becker, D. (2002). The developmental and psychopathology of social anxiety disorder. Biological Psychiatry, 51, 4458.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Posner, M. I., & Peterson, S. E. (1990). The attention system of the human brain. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 13, 2542.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Radloff, J. S. (1977). The CES-D Scale: A self-report depression scale for research in the general population. Applied Psychological Measurement, 1, 385401.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rapee, R. M., & Szollos, A. A. (2002). Developmental antecedents of clinical anxiety in childhood. Behaviour Change, 19, 146157.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosenbaum, J. F., Biederman, J., Bolduc-Murphy, B. A., Faraone, S., Chaloff, J., Hirshfeld, D. R., et al. (1993). Behavioral inhibition in childhood: A risk factor for anxiety disorders. Harvard Review of Psychiatry, 1, 216.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rothbart, M. (1981). Measurement of temperament in infancy. Child Development, 52, 569578.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rothbart, M. K., & Bates, J. E. (1998). Temperament. In W. Damon (Ser. Ed.) & N. Eisenberg (Vol. Ed.), Handbook of child psychology: Vol. 3. Social, emotional and personality development (5th ed.). New York: Wiley.
Rothbart, M. K., & Derryberry, D. (1981). Development of individual differences in temperament. In M. E. Lamb & A. L. Brown (Eds.), Advances in developmental psychology (Vol. 1). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Rothbart, M. K., & Goldsmith, H. H. (1985). Three approaches to the study of infant temperament. Developmental Review, 5, 237260.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rothbart, M. K., Ziaie, H., & O'Boyle, C. G. (1992). Self regulation and emotion in infancy. New Directions for Child Development, 55, 723.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schwartz, C. E., Snidman, N., & Kagan, J. (1999). Adolescent social anxiety as an outcome of inhibited temperament in childhood. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 38, 10081015.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Spitzer, R. L., Endicott, J., & Robins, E. (1978). Research diagnostic criteria: Rationale and reliability. Archives of General Psychiatry, 36, 773782.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thompson, R. W. (1994). Emotion regulation: A theme in search of definition. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 59(No. 240), 2552.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tabachnick, B., & Fidell, L. (1996). Using multivariate statistics. New York: HarperCollins.
Thomas, A., & Chess, S. (1977). Temperament and development. New York: Brunner/Mazel.
van den Boom, D. C. (1995). Do first-year intervention effects endure? Follow-up during toddlerhood of a sample of Dutch irritable infants. Child Development, 66, 17981816.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Verhulst, F. C., van der Ende, J., Ferdinand, R. F., & Kasius, M.C. (1997). The prevalence of DSM-III-R diagnoses in a national sample of Dutch adolescents. Archives of General Psychiatry, 54, 329336.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wachs, T. D., & Kohnstamm, G. A. (2001). The bidirectional nature of temperament–context links. In T. Wachs & G. Kohnstamm (Eds.), Temperament in context (pp. 201222). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Whitehead, M., & Frick, J. (2004). Individual and developmental differences in attention regulation during the Still-Face procedure. Poster presented at the International Conference on Infant Studies, Chicago.