Adults’ Implicit Reactions to Typical and Atypical Infant Cues

Abstract

This study investigates the valence of adults' implicit associations to typical and atypical infant cues, and the consistency of responses across the different stimuli. 48 non-parent adults (25 females, 23 males) were presented three kinds of infant cues, typical cry (TD-cry), atypical cry (ASD-cry) and infant faces, and their implicit associations were measured by means of the Single Category Implicit Association Test (SC-IAT). Results showed that, independently of gender, the implicit associations to typical and atypical infant cries had the same negative valence, whereas infant faces were implicitly associated to the positive dimension. Moreover, data showed that implicit responses to the different infant cues were not associated. These results suggest that more controlled processes influence the perceptions of atypical infant cry, and confirm the need to investigate individual reactions to infant cues by adopting a multilevel approach.

Implicit associations to infant cry: Genetics and early care experiences influence caregiving propensities

“…Indeed, past research has gathered evidence of different, albeit complementary, processing mechanisms of infant cries and faces. For instance, a study that investigated the association between implicit associations to different infant cues (face and cry) showed substantial independence between responses (Senese, Santamaria, Sergi & Esposito, 2019b). The implication of this latter result is that modulation of genetic polymorphisms to infant cues of different modalities may affect caregiving propensities in a different way.…”