Role of early caregiver predictability in brain network flexibility during the first year of life

Poster Session E - Monday, March 31, 2025, 2:30 – 4:30 pm EDT, Back Bay Ballroom/Republic Ballroom

Priyanka Ghosh¹ (priyankaghoshmail@gmail.com), Laurel Gabard-Durnam¹; ¹Northeastern University, Boston

Early brain development is significantly shaped by environmental influences, including primary caregivers’ behaviors. One key measure of caregiver behavior is maternal entropy, which reflects the degree of predictability in maternal interactions with the infant, for example, during play. We ask whether and how early maternal entropy during mother-infant play interactions shapes brain network flexibility, indexed by EEG microstate transitional probabilities between network configurations. As part of an ongoing longitudinal study in South Africa, we video-recorded naturalistic, dyadic interactions between infants and their primary caregivers during two timepoints (visit sessions). We calculated the predictability of caregivers’ behavior, focusing on vocalizing, object holding, and pointing. To calculate entropy scores, we hand-annotated videos in Datavyu, following established protocols (Davis et al., 2017). We also collected saline-based 128-channel resting-state EEG data from the same infants at both timepoints (2–6 months, N=242; and 6–12 months, N=249). EEG microstate transitional probabilities were computed using HAPPEv4.1. Our study aims to examine the relationship between maternal entropy during mother-infant interactions and the transitional probabilities of infant microstates, focusing on transitions between auditory/visual and attention microstate networks. We will apply linear mixed-effects models to investigate whether maternal entropy predicts infant microstate transition probabilities. We hypothesize that higher maternal entropy may correlate with more flexible microstate transitions, reflecting enhanced neural adaptability, whereas lower entropy may yield more rigid configurations. However, excessive caregiver unpredictability might also contribute to dysregulated infant brain function. Understanding these dynamics could help inform future interventions aimed at optimizing caregiver-infant interactions for healthy cognitive and emotional development

Topic Area: OTHER