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Evidence on newborns’ discrimination of emotional facial expressions is scarce, and the question of what is the nature of the visual information that newborns rely on to perform such discrimination remains open. Here, we manipulated the spatial frequency (SF) content of the stimuli by selectively removing low spatial frequency (LSF) and high spatial frequency bands using newborn-appropriate cutoffs to investigate what information newborns use when preferring and discriminating between dynamic displays showing happy and fearful expressions unfolding over time. Using a preferential looking paradigm, in Study 1 (N = 63, 59% females, 92% White), we showed that newborns looked longer to happy over fearful expressions in unfiltered (broad spatial frequency) and high-pass (high spatial frequency.0.6 cycles per degree [cpd]) faces but not in low-pass (LSF, 0.5 cpd) faces. In Study 2 (N = 22, 59% females, 91% White), newborns tested in a visual habituation paradigm showed successful discrimination of the two LSF emotions. Results show that newborns can discriminate between dynamic images of happy and fearful facial expressions containing either extreme low SF (,0.5 cpd) information or higher SF (.0.6 cpd) bandwidth. Their preference for the happy expression was present for intact and high-pass filtered faces but not for low-pass faces. This SF effect is tentatively driven by an enhancement of attentional response to the LSF fearful face, whereas the response to the happy face is unaffected by the SF manipulation.

Background: Rule learning (RL) is the ability to extract and generalize higher-order repetition-based structures. Children with Developmental Dyslexia (DD) often report difficulties in learning complex regularities in sequential stimuli, which might be due to the complexity of the rule to be learned. Learning high-order repetition-based rules represents a building block for the development of language skills. Aims: This study investigates the ability to extract and generalize simple, repetition-based visual rules (e.g., ABA) in 8–11-year-old children without (TD) and with a diagnosis of Development Dyslexia (DD) and its relationship with language and reading skills. Method: Using a forced-choice paradigm, children were first exposed to a visual sequence containing a repetition-based rule (e.g., ABA) and were then asked to recognize familiar and novel rules generated by new visual elements. Standardized language and reading tests were also administered to both groups. Results: The accuracy in recognizing rules was above chance for both groups, even though DD children were less accurate than TD children, suggesting a less efficient RL mechanism in the DD group. Moreover, visual RL was positively correlated with both language and reading skills. Conclusion: These results further confirm the crucial role of RL in the acquisition of linguistic skills and mastering reading abilities.

Il ritmo è una componente intrinseca del comportamento umano e pervade il nostro ambiente fin dalla vita intrauterina. Questa tesi di dottorato ha esplorato come il nostro cervello sfrutta il ritmo per ottimizzare le interazioni con l'ambiente nelle prime fasi della vita, testando l'effetto del ritmo su due funzioni motorie e cognitive dei neonati: la Suzione Non-Nutritiva (SNN), un comportamento ritmico presente già in utero, e l'attenzione visiva, che negli adulti sappiamo esse modulata dal ritmo. Nove studi hanno affrontato 3 domande principali: 1) Il ritmo modula la SNN alla nascita e l'orientamento dell'attenzione visuospaziale alla nascita e a 2 mesi? 2) L'arricchimento ritmico prenatale modula gli effetti del ritmo sulla SNN e sull'attenzione visuospaziale alla nascita e a 2 mesi? 3) Il ritmo influenza la percezione visiva negli adulti e nei neonati? Lo Studio 1 ha indagato l’effetto della stimolazione acustica ritmica vs. non-ritmica sulla SNN. I risultati mostrano che la frequenza della SNN diminuisce durante la presentazione del suono non-ritmico, che ha quindi un effetto inibitorio sulla SNN dei neonati. Lo Studio 2 ha esplorato l'effetto della stimolazione ritmica prenatale sulla SNN e sulla capacità di adattare il proprio ritmo di suzione a stimolazioni ritmiche esterne. I risultati suggeriscono che 1) l'esposizione arricchita al ritmo aumenta la frequenza della SNN dopo la nascita e 2) la risposta inibitoria ai suoni non-ritmici varia in funzione della quantità di stimolazione ritmica prenatale ricevuta. Gli Studi 3a-3b hanno indagato l'effetto del ritmo sull'attenzione visuospaziale, testando la capacità di disancorare l'attenzione visiva da uno stimolo centrale (S1) ritmico vs. non-ritmico alla nascita e a 2 mesi. I risultati mostrano che a 2 mesi, ma non alla nascita, i neonati sono più lenti a disancorare l'attenzione visiva da S1 non-ritmico rispetto a quando S1 è ritmico o statico. Lo Studio 3c è stato condotto per esaminare l'eventuale i, Rhythm, the recurrence of temporal structures over time, is an inherent part of human behaviour and pervades our environment since intrauterine life. This doctoral thesis explored how our brain harnesses rhythmic cues to optimise interactions with the environment in the earliest stages of life by testing the effect of rhythm on two infants’ motor and cognitive functions: Non-Nutritive Sucking (NNS), which is an endogenous rhythmic behaviour available in utero, and visual attention, which in adults is known to be modulated by rhythmic cues. Nine studies addressed 3 main questions: 1) Does rhythmic stimulation modulate NNS at birth and the orienting of visuospatial attention at birth and 2 months? 2) Does prenatal rhythmic enrichment modulate the effects of rhythm on NNS and visuospatial attention at birth and 2 months? 3) Does rhythm affect visual perception in adults and infants? Study 1 investigated the impact of rhythmic vs. non-rhythmic sounds on NNS. Results showed that NNS rate was lower when the non-rhythmic sound was presented contingent upon sucking than when the rhythmic sound or no sound was presented. These findings suggest that non-rhythmic acoustic stimulation produces an inhibitory effect on newborns’ NNS behaviour. Study 2 explored the effect of prenatal rhythmic stimulation on NNS and the ability to modulate the NNS sucking rhythm in response to external rhythmic stimulation. Results showed that 1) the enriched exposure to rhythm enhanced the NNS rate and pressure after birth, and 2) the inhibitory response to non-rhythmic sounds varied as a function of the amount of prenatal rhythmic stimulation. Studies 3a-3b investigated the effect of rhythm on visuospatial attention, testing the ability to disengage visual attention from a rhythmic vs. non-rhythmic central stimulus (S1) at birth and 2 months. Results showed that at 2 months, but not at birth, infants were slower in disengaging visual attention from a non-rhythmic S1 than when S1 was rhythmic or s

Data from 83,423 parent reports of temperament (surgency, negative affectivity, and regulatory capacity) in infants, toddlers, and children from 341 samples gathered in 59 countries were used to investigate the relations among culture, gender, and temperament. Between-nation differences in temperament were larger than those obtained in similar studies of adult personality, and most pronounced for negative affectivity. Nationlevel patterns of negative affectivity were consistent across infancy, toddlerhood, and childhood, and patterns of regulatory capacity were consistent between infancy and toddlerhood. Nations that previously reported high extraversion, high conscientiousness, and low neuroticism in adults were found to demonstrate high surgency in infants and children, and countries reporting lowadult openness and high adult neuroticism reported high temperamental negative affectivity. Negative affectivity was high in Southern Asia, Western Asia, and South America and low in Northern and Western Europe. Countries in which children were rated as high in negative affectivity had cultural orientations reflecting collectivism, high power distance, and short-term orientation. Surgency was high in Southeastern and Southern Asia and Southern Europe and low in Eastern Asian countries characterized by philosophies of long-term orientation. Low personal income was associated with high negative affectivity. Gender differences in temperament were largely consistent in direction with prior studies, revealing higher regulatory capacity in females than males and higher surgency in males than females, with these differences becoming more pronounced at later ages.

Adults and children easily distinguish between fine-grained variations in trustworthiness intensity based on facial appearance, but the developmental origins of this fundamental social skill are still debated. Using a fast periodic visual stimulation (FPVS) oddball paradigm coupled with electroencephalographic (EEG) recording, we investigated neural discrimination of morphed faces that adults perceive as low- and high-trustworthy in a sample of 6-month-old infants (N = 29; 56% male; Mage = 196.8 days; all White) and young adults (N = 21; 40% male; Mage = 24.61 years; all White) recruited in Italy. Stimulus sequences were presented at 6 Hz with deviant faces interleaved every fifth stimulus (i.e., 1.2 Hz); oddball category (high/low trustworthiness) was varied within subjects. FPVS responses were analyzed at both frequencies of interest and their harmonics as a function of deviant type (high- vs. low-trustworthy) over occipital and occipitolateral electrode clusters. For both infants and adults, the baseline response did not differ between trustworthiness conditions. Significant responses were centered on the right parietal electrodes in infants, and on the occipital and left occipitotemporal clusters in adults. Oddball responses were significant for both infants and adults, with cross-age differences in the topographical localization of the response on the scalp. Overall, results suggest that, by the age of 6 months, infants discriminate between faces that adults rate as high and low in trustworthiness, extending prior evidence of early sensitivity to this face dimension in humans.

By 27-week gestation the brain undergoes extensive changes driven by external input, suggesting that learning occurs even before birth. Much of the sensory input that reaches the foetus has a rhythmic structure, and literature suggests that intrauterine rhythmic experience may contribute to the emergence of complex skills during postnatal life. Adult studies show that rhythm entrains attention enhancing information processing. Here, we hypothesised that exposure to rhythmic stimulation may boost attention from the earliest stages of neurodevelopment. To this end, we tested the short- and long-term effects of enriched multisensory rhythmic stimulation provided across the last trimester of gestation on visual spatial attention at birth and 2 months postpartum. Starting from 29-week gestation two groups of mothers follows a rhythmic or non-rhythmic stimulation protocol, and infants’ visuo-spatial attention skills are tested at birth and 2 months using a disengagement task in which accuracy and latency of orienting toward a peripheral target are measured as a function of the rhythmic vs random temporal structure of a central cue. Data collection is in progress: we expect rhythm to constrain the efficiency of attentional orienting differently for infants in the two groups.

In mammals, including humans, affective touch (AT) supports the establishment and maintenance of social connections and mitigates the effects of social conflict and ostracism. AT is used to describe slowly moving, low-forced mechanical stimulation that is frequently perceived as pleasant. In humans, AT has been addressed particularly for its role in promoting bonding and emotional regulation during early development; however, more recent studies have suggested that AT also preserves physical and emotional well-being in adulthood. Here, we investigated whether AT can buffer adults’ experience of negative emotions as reflected in their behavioral and physiological responses to emotionally arousing stimuli. Participants were stimulated on their forearms using AT or tapping (T) while they viewed a series of emotionally arousing and neutral images, and we measured their skin conductance response and their explicit rating of the images’ unpleasantness. We found that AT, but not T, reduced the arousal and perceived unpleasantness of the emotional stimuli but not the neutral ones, revealing the soothing role of AT in emotional contexts. The second aim of the study was to explore the possibility that AT might benefit some individuals more than others, according to their individual differences. To this aim, we assessed individuals’ empathy and sensory processing sensitivity, as well as their perception of AT itself. Results revealed that while empathy did not predict changes in emotional processing irrespective of tactile stimulation, individuals with higher sensitivity reported AT as less pleasant.We discuss the possible factors mediating the observed interindividual variability in AT perception.