A critical period for experience-dependent development of the feelings of safety during early infancy: A polyvagal perspective on anger and psychometric tools to assess perceived safety

• Published in: Frontiers in integrative neuroscience Vol. 16; p. 915170
• Main Authors: Poli, Andrea, Gemignani, Angelo, Chiorri, Carlo, Miccoli, Mario
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Lausanne Frontiers Research Foundation 18.07.2022; Frontiers Media S.A
• Subjects: Age; Anger; Child development; Cortex (cingulate); Cortex (parietal); Critical period; Emotions; Event-related potentials; Face; Fear; Heart rate; hierarchical emotional response; Infants; interpersonal violence; myelination; Nervous system; Neuroscience; polyvagal theory; Safety; Threats; vagus nerve
• ISSN: 1662-5145; 1662-5145
• DOI: 10.3389/fnint.2022.915170

According to this, research on 5-, 12-, and 15-month-old infants has shown that an adult-like, late, non-linear pattern of cortical response to masked faces at various levels of visibility emerged as early as 5 months of age, starting around 900 ms, possibly due to the development of the right fusiform gyrus (Guy et al., 2016) and its increased sensitivity to fearful faces from 5 to 12 months (Xie et al., 2019; Chen et al., 2021). [...]in infants aged 5–12 months exposed to facial expressions of happiness, fear, and anger with normal levels of visibility, the N290 event-related potential (ERP) component was found to be larger in amplitude in response to angry and happy faces than to angry ones, revealing greater cortical activation in the right fusiform face area, while the P400 and the negative-central (Nc) ERP components were found to be larger in amplitude in response to angry faces than to happy and fearful ones, revealing greater activation of the posterior cingulate cortex (PCC)/precuneus associated with the allocation of infants' attention. According to polyvagal theory, the neural evaluation of risk is achieved through neuroception, a neural reflexive mechanism, which is distinct from perception and is capable of instantly shifting the physiological state and of distinguishing safe, dangerous, or life-threatening environmental and visceral features. [...]considering the increased UMR of the PNS during the first 3 months of life (Pereyra et al., 1992), it could be hypothesized that it may represent a sensitive period for early environmental safety detection through the DVC, in order to possibly establish a baseline threshold for threat detection and for the emergence of fear.