Nati per essere in sintonia: Il ruolo delle vocalizzazioni affettive nella sincronizzazione neurale tra madre e bambino.

The interaction between caregiver and child has been the subject of extensive study over the years, employing a range of investigative methodologies. The advent of hyperscanning techniques has enabled researchers to gain insights into the neurobiological processes occurring during mother-child interactions, leading to the proposal that a synchronisation exists between them. This study examines the dynamics of mother-infant interactions, focusing on the effects of maternal behaviour and psychological well-being on infant emotionality and neural synchrony during the Still-Face Procedure (SFP). Social interactions, especially those occurring early in life, play a critical role in the development of neural systems and are essential for cognitive and emotional development. The present study recruited 20 mother-infant dyads and used electroencephalogram (EEG) hyperscanning to measure interpersonal neural synchrony (INS) between mothers and infants during the SFP. Analyses of the effects of maternal affective vocalisations and touch on infants' emotional responses were conducted, and correlations between maternal psychological states and maternal behaviours during the SFP were examined. Results indicate that the SFP effectively induced changes in infant emotionality, with a significant reduction in positive emotionality during the still-face episode, followed by a partial recovery during the reunion episode. Maternal affective vocalisations were positively correlated with increased infant positive emotionality, particularly for with low risk of depressive symptoms. The EEG data showed significant correlation between frontal alpha PLVs and maternal affective vocalisation, especially during the reunion episode. Findings highlight the importance of maternal affective behaviour and psychological health in shaping infant emotional development, and contribute to a better understanding of the neural and behavioural mechanisms underlying early social interactions.