When you go low, I go high: Negative coordination of physiological synchrony among parents and children

Abstract

The parent–child relationship is an important context for children's emotional development. The current study assessed 43 parent–child dyads while watching a positive film clip and a negative film clip, in order to examine whether partner's physiological reactivity demonstrated dyadic synchrony, and whether this was associated with children's prosocial empathy. Respiratory sinus arrhythmia was measured in both caretakers and children (ages 9–14) and a continuous time series was estimated in order to maximize temporal resolution of physiological dynamics. Dyads varied in both the magnitude and direction of synchrony, with correlation coefficients ranging from moderately negative; r = −.44 (increases in one partner correspond to decreases in the other), to moderately positive; r = .55 (increases in one partner correspond to increases in the other). For both conditions, negative synchrony was correlated with higher child‐reported empathy. For the negative mood condition, this effect was moderated by caretaker's emotional acceptance such that positive synchrony was associated with lower levels of empathy among dyads in which caretaker emotional acceptance was lower. These results suggest that positive physiological synchrony during a negative mood condition may not be adaptive for children when their caretaker lacks the skills to appropriately socialize their child's emotional development.

Proximity and Touch are associated with Neural but not Physiological Synchrony in Naturalistic Mother-Infant Interactions

“…Furthermore, three-year-old children and their mothers showed stronger RSA synchrony during higher levels of maternal teaching and weaker synchrony when mothers were disengaged (Skoranski, Lunkenheimer, & Lucas-Thompson, 2017). On the other hand, negative RSA synchrony in a video watching situation was related to higher child-reported empathy at ages 9-14 years, while positive RSA synchrony was associated with lower levels of empathy among the dyads (Creavy, Gatzke-Kopp, Zhang, Fishbein, & Kiser, 2020). The disparate results emphasize the critical nature of context and age for physiological synchrony and suggest that the potential function of physiological synchrony is not straightforward.…”

Parent‐adolescent physiological synchrony: Moderating effects of adolescent emotional insecurity

“…Fourth, all the measures in the present study were obtained in the first wave, future studies are encouraged to evaluate how physiological synchrony develop over time with repeatedly measured physiological synchrony. In addition, even though how physiological synchrony may shape adolescent development is beyond the scope of the present work, it remains a critical next step for future research (e.g., Creavy, Gatzke‐Kopp, Zhang, Fishbein, & Kiser, 2019). Fifth, although pubertal status may be a covariate that is linked to both parent‐adolescent conflict and adolescent emotional insecurity, the present study did not control for it due to the absence of such measurement.…”

A systematic review of caregiver–child physiological synchrony across systems: Associations with behavior and child functioning

“…Conversely, stronger positive synchrony while simultaneously viewing positive and negative film clips was found to be associated with lower child self-reported empathy, especially when parents were rated lower on emotional acceptance (Creavy et al, 2020). While this study also used strong statistical methods assessing within-dyad associations accounting for overall between-dyad differences, simultaneously watching the same film clip does not necessarily support interpersonal interaction and so this study does not fully meet the definition of physiological synchrony proposed here.…”