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Recent studies have shown that the association between maternal depression and child outcome can be moderated by children's experience of childcare (e.g., daycare) during early childhood (0-5 years). We also know that maternal depression in the child's early years has long-term associations with child development. However, the moderating role of childcare quality on long-term associations between maternal depression and child outcome has not been thoroughly investigated. This article examined longitudinal associations between probable maternal depression (PMD) during early childhood (0-5 years) and childcare quality on children's emotional and behavioral development at the age of 7-8 years (N = 207). Childcare quality was evaluated through observations within the settings. PMD during early childhood was assessed using complementary information from interviews conducted with the mother and current maternal symptoms were assessed using the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale. Internalizing and externalizing behaviors were reported by the mother, father and the child at age 7-8 years. Results indicate that when mothers reported clinically relevant depression in early childhood, 7-8-year-old children demonstrate fewer behavioral problems if they attended a higher quality childcare setting. The moderating role of childcare quality remained after considering current maternal depression symptoms. Therefore, it is important to ensure high-quality childcare during early childhood to optimize child development.

Temperament and psychopathology are intimately related; however, research on the prospective associations between positive emotionality, defined as a child's positive mood states and high engagement with the environment, and psychopathology is inconclusive. We examined the longitudinal relation between positive emotionality and internalizing problems in young children from the general population. Furthermore, we explored whether executive functioning mediates any observed association. Within a population-based Dutch birth cohort, we observed positive emotionality in 802 children using the laboratory temperament assessment battery at age 3 years. Child behavior checklist (CBCL) internalizing problems (consisting of Emotionally Reactive, Anxious/Depressed, and Withdrawn scales) were assessed at age 6 years. Parents rated their children's executive functioning at ages 4 years. Children with a lower positive emotionality at age 3 had a higher risk of withdrawn problems at age 6 years (OR = 1.20 per SD decrease in positive emotionality score, 95 % CI: 1.01, 1.42). This effect was not explained by preexisting internalizing problems. This association was partly mediated by more problems in the shifting domain of executive functioning (p < 0.001). We did not find any relation between positive emotionality and the CBCL emotionally reactive or anxious/depressed scales. Although the effect sizes were moderate, our results suggest that low levels of positive emotionality at preschool age can result in children's inflexibility and rigidity later in life. The inflexibility and rigidity are likely to affect the child's drive to engage with the environment, and thereby lead to withdrawn problems. Further research is needed to replicate these findings.

Background: The impact of personal familiarity upon children's developing emotion-processing has been largely ignored in previous research, yet may prove particularly important given the emotional salience of such stimuli and children's greater exposure to familiar others compared to strangers. We examined the impact of personal familiarity upon developing facial expression recognition (FER)., Methods: Participants included 153 children, 4-15 years old. We employed dynamic expressions of five emotions (happy, sad, anger, fear, disgust), posed by familiar (parents, teachers) and unfamiliar identities., Results: Accuracy improved with age for recognising sad and fear expressions, but not anger. Children tended to correctly recognise happiness and fear at lower intensities. The impact of familiarity on FER depended on emotion-category. Familiarity did not affect recognition of sad expressions, but children were less accurate at recognising anger, fear, and disgust in familiar individuals compared to strangers., Conclusion: Personal familiarity may exert a distracting effect on children's performance. Findings highlight the importance of incorporating different emotion-categories and familiarity when examining the development of FER. Clinical implications are discussed.

Background: This study examined the effects of age and two novel factors (intensity and emotion category) on healthy children's developing emotion-processing from 4 to 15 years using two matching paradigms., Methods: An explicit emotion-matching task was employed in which children matched the emotion of a target individual, and an implicit task whereby participants ignored the emotive facial stimulus and matched identity. Four intensities (25%, 50%, 75%, and 100%) for each of five emotion categories (sad, anger, happy, fear, and disgust) were included and provided a novel avenue of emotion-processing exploration., Results: Increasing age significantly improved children's performance on both tasks, particularly for fear and disgust. Age was not associated with more subtle processing (i.e., lower intensity of expression). When explicitly matching emotion expressions, increasing intensity was associated with improved performance. When matching identities (implicit emotion-matching), emotion category and intensity influenced task performance. Sex effects were minimal., Conclusions: In children, age, facial expression intensity and emotion category are important for predicting accuracy on emotion-processing tasks. Emotion category and expression intensity differentially affect performance on explicit and implicit emotion-processing tasks.

There is debate in cognitive neuroscience whether conscious versus unconscious processing represents a categorical or a quantitative distinction. The purpose of the study was to explore this matter using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). We first established objective thresholds of the critical temporal parameters for overt and covert presentations of fear and disgust. Next we applied these stimulus parameters in an fMRI experiment to determine whether non-consciously perceived (covert) facial expressions of fear and disgust show the same double dissociation (amygdala response to fear, insula to disgust) observed with consciously perceived (overt) stimuli. A backward masking paradigm was used. In the psychophysics experiment, the following parameters were established: 30-ms target duration for the covert condition, and 170-ms target duration for the overt condition. Results of the block-design fMRI study indicated substantial differences underlying the perception of fearful and disgusted facial expressions, with significant effects of both emotion and target duration. Findings for the overt condition (170 ms) confirm previous evidence of amygdala activation to fearful faces, and insula activation to disgusted faces, and a double dissociation between these two emotions. In the covert condition (30 ms), the amygdala was not activated to fear, nor was the insula activated to disgust. Overall, findings demonstrate significant differences between the neural responses to fear and to disgust, and between the covert presentations of these two emotions. These results therefore suggest distinct neural correlates of conscious and unconscious emotion perception.

Objective Prenatal exposure to stress and fever are factors lowering seizure threshold in animal models. The fever effect on seizure threshold is well documented in human infants, however the associations between maternal perinatal stress and infants’ susceptibility to seizures is unknown. This is the first study in humans to investigate longitudinally, whether in humans, the effect of maternal perinatal emotional symptoms such as stress, anxiety and depression that may trigger a biological stress response on age at first seizure occurrence. Method The study sample is a subgroup drawn from a longitudinal follow up cohort (3D cohort study: Design, Develop, Discover, N = 2366 mother-infant dyads). Twenty-nine otherwise healthy infants who had a febrile seizure (FS) episode before the last follow-up visit (around 24 months of age) were studied. Mothers completed questionnaires regarding their emotional health at each pregnancy trimester and at three months postpartum. The link between maternal emotional symptoms and infant age at first FS was assessed through correlations and multiple regressions. Results We found that maternal anxiety symptoms during the second trimester of pregnancy are linked to the age at first FS ( r (23) = −0.459, p = 0.021) and explain 21.1% of its variance. Postnatal maternal depression symptoms at 3 months postpartum were also associated with the age at first FS ( r (23) = −0.587, p = 0.002) and explained an additional 17.6% of variance. Together, the variables explained 38.7% of the variance in age at first FS. Maternal perceived stress symptoms at 3 months postpartum were also linked to the age at first FS ( r (23) = −0.418, p = 0.038), however, stress did not significantly contribute to the variance of age at first FS.. Significance Our results suggest a link between increased perinatal maternal emotional symptoms and the age at first FS. An earlier age at first FS may be the manifestation of a lower seizure threshold. Early first seizure occurrence is a risk factor for compromised neurological and cognitive development. Further studies should address the mechanisms by which perinatal maternal emotional symptoms may have an impact on seizure threshold in humans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A vast body of literature shows that maternal depression has long-term adverse consequences for children. However, only very few studies have documented the effect of maternal depression on children's ability to process emotional expressions and even fewer incorporated measures of observed maternal sensitivity to further tease apart whether it is the symptoms per se or the associated impact via maternal sensitivity that affects children's developing emotion-processing abilities. In a large community sample of Dutch preschoolers (N = 770), we examined independent and mediated effects of maternal depressive symptoms and sensitivity on children's ability to recognize emotional expressions using a nonverbal and a verbal task paradigm. Maternal depressive symptoms predicted less accurate emotion labeling in children, while maternal sensitivity was associated with more accurate emotion matching, especially for sadness and anger. Maternal sensitivity did not mediate the observed associations between mothers’ depressive symptoms and children's emotion recognition, and effects were similar for boys and girls. Given that maternal depressive symptoms and sensitivity affected nonoverlapping areas of young children's emotion recognition, prevention and intervention efforts should focus on both alleviating maternal depressive symptoms and improving maternal sensitivity at the same time in order to maximize benefit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

IMPORTANCE Maternal depression is a major risk factor for the development of children's mental health problems. No population-based study to date has examined whether early child care spanning the full preschool period from infancy onward is protective for children of depressed mothers. OBJECTIVE To examine whether early child care moderates associations between maternal depressive symptoms (MDSs) and child internalizing problems (emotional problems [EPs], separation anxiety symptoms, and social withdrawal symptoms [SWSs]) during the preschool period. DESIGN AND SETTING Population-based prospective cohort study within the Quebec Longitudinal Study of Child Development. PARTICIPANTS Quebec Longitudinal Study of Child Development participants (n = 1759) assessed repeatedly between ages 5 and 60 months. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES High-level trajectories of EPs, SWSs, and separation anxiety symptoms between ages 17 and 60 months. RESULTS Child care age at entry moderated associations between MDSs and child internalizing problems. Among children of mothers with elevated MDSs, reduced odds ratios for EPs and SWSs were found for those entering child care early (0.24; 95% CI, 0.09-0.66 for EPs and 0.29; 95% CI, 0.09-0.92 for SWSs) or late (0.29; 95% CI, 0.11-0.77 for EPs and 0.21; 95% CI, 0.07-0,65 for SWSs) compared with those remaining in maternal care. Child care type moderated the association between MDSs and child EPs; children of mothers with elevated MDSs who received group-based child care had lower odds ratios for EPs than those who remained in maternal care (O.21; 95% CI, 0.09-0.48) or those who were cared for by a relative or babysitter (0.40; 95% CI, 0.17-0.94). CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE Regulated early child care services reduced the risks for internalizing problems for children of mothers with elevated MDSs. Regulated child care services may be used as a public health intervention to buffer the negative effect of maternal depression on children's internalizing problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Previous research highlights the significance of a functional polymorphism located in the promoter region (5-HTTLPR) of the serotonin transporter gene in emotional behaviour. This study examined the effect of the 5-HTTLPR polymorphism on emotion processing in a large number of healthy preschoolers. Methods: The 5-HTTLPR genotype was classified in 605 children as homozygous for the short allele (SS), homozygous for the long allele (LL), or heterozygous (LS). Emotion-processing was assessed using age-appropriate computer tasks where children matched happy, sad, angry, and fearful facial expressions preceded by a shape-matching task to assess basic matching ability. Results: We found that young children could differentiate between emotion categories ( F = 12.1, p < .001). The effect of 5-HTTLPR genotype depended on the emotion category presented ( F = 2.3, p = .031). This effect was explained by the finding that SS children were less accurate at recognising fearful faces than LL or LS children ( F = 5.3, p = .005). We did not find any significant differences as a result of 5-HTTLPR genotype for happy, sad or angry expressions ( p > .05). Conclusions: Results indicate that 5-HTTLPR allele status selectively impacts the processing of fearful but not other facial expressions. This pattern is already apparent in very young typically developing children. Results may signal an early vulnerability for affective problems before disorders emerge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Although early-onset conduct problems predict both psychiatric and health problems in adult life, little research has been done to index neural correlates of conduct problems. Emerging research suggests that a subgroup of children with conduct problems and elevated levels of callous-unemotional traits may be genetically vulnerable to manifesting disturbances in neural reactivity to emotional stimuli indexing distress. Using functional MRI, the authors evaluated differences in neural response to emotional stimuli between boys with conduct problems and elevated levels of callous-unemotional traits and comparison boys. Method: Seventeen boys with conduct problems and elevated levels of callousunemotional traits and 13 comparison boys of equivalent age (mean=11 years) and IQ (mean=100) viewed blocked presentations of fearful and neutral faces. For each face, participants distinguished the sex of the face via manual response. Results: Relative to the comparison group, boys with conduct problems and elevated levels of callous-unemotional traits manifested lesser right amygdala activity to fearful faces. Conclusions: This finding is in line with data from studies of adults with antisocial behavior and callous-unemotional traits (i.e., psychopaths), as well as from a recent study of adolescents with callous-unemotional traits, and suggests that the neural substrates of emotional impairment associated with callous-unemotional antisocial behavior are already present in childhood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]