Stationary and ambulatory attention patterns are differentially associated with early temperamental risk for socioemotional problems: Preliminary evidence from a multimodal eye-tracking investigation

Abstract

Behavioral Inhibition (BI) is a temperament type that predicts social withdrawal in childhood and anxiety disorders later in life. However, not all BI children develop anxiety. Attention bias (AB) may enhance the vulnerability for anxiety in BI children, and interfere with their development of effective emotion regulation. In order to fully probe attention patterns, we used traditional measures of reaction time (RT), stationary eye-tracking, and recently emerging mobile eye-tracking measures of attention in a sample of 5- to 7-year-olds characterized as BI (N = 23) or non-BI (N = 58) using parent reports. There were no BI-related differences in RT or stationary eye-tracking indices of AB in a dot-probe task. However, findings in a subsample from whom eye-tracking data were collected during a live social interaction indicated that BI children (N = 12) directed fewer gaze shifts to the stranger than non-BI children (N = 25). Moreover, the frequency of gazes toward the stranger was positively associated with stationary AB only in BI, but not in non-BI, children. Hence, BI was characterized by a consistent pattern of attention across stationary and ambulatory measures. We demonstrate the utility of mobile eye-tracking as an effective tool to extend the assessment of attention and regulation to social interactive contexts.

Variable- and person-centered approaches to affect-biased attention in infancy reveal unique relations with infant negative affect and maternal anxiety

“…Second, the literature should move away from reaction time-based difference scores, as they can exacerbate measurement error 53 . On this point, recent reviews focused on adults 54 and children 10 suggest that measures more proximal to the processing of salient stimuli, captured via functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), event-related potentials (ERPs), or eye-tracking have more robust psychometric properties. In the current study, the use of eye-tracking across multiple measures incorporates both recommendations, while having the added bonus of being developmentally appropriate for use starting in the first months of life.…”

“…Comparisons of different attention tasks across studies have failed to provide consistent results. Emerging research suggests that patterns of affect-biased attention across tasks within individuals may better capture relations with anxiety and anxiety risk 10 , 11 . Thus, it is important for researchers to examine relations between multiple attentional mechanisms captured by different tasks within a single sample 12 .…”

“…Indeed, when considering affect-biased attention to threat specifically, research using a single task has found that both a bias toward threat 13 – 16 and a bias away from threat 17 – 20 are related to anxiety and fearful temperament. Additional work has shown that patterns of attention across tasks, rather than a specific bias towards or away from threat, are related to anxiety 11 and fearful temperament 10 . In particular, it appears that the stability of attention patterns, rather than the directionality (towards vs away) of attention, is most clearly linked to socioemotional profiles.…”

Navigating Through the Experienced Environment: Insights From Mobile Eye Tracking

“…At the other end of the age spectrum, Isaacowitz and colleagues (2015) found no difference in bias to positive valence if selecting from the environment with MET, although SET studies had consistently shown a positivity bias for older adults. And, in between, Fu, Nelson, Borge, Buss, and Pérez-Edgar (2019) had 5- to 7-year-old children complete a standard attention-bias task with reaction time and SET measures. The same children also engaged in a standardized interaction with an adult stranger (modified from Buss, 2011).…”

“…One of the first studies to apply mobile eye tracking to motor processes and movement in infants. Fu, X., Nelson, E. E., Borge, M., Buss, K. A., & Pérez-Edgar, K. (2019). (See References).…”