Negativity Bias in Early Childhood: Fear Versus Anger, Which Is More Potent?

Infants' heightened response to negative emotions is thought to be an important element in the development of attentional biases to threat. The current study examined whether infants display a bias toward negative emotions, whether fearful expressions elicit a stronger attentional response compared to angry expressions, and whether age moderates the differences in responses. A cross-sectional sample consisting of 222 infants (5- to 7- month-old, n = 77; 11- to 13- month-olds, n = 78; 17- to 19- month-olds, n = 67) viewed dynamic facial expressions (angry, fearful, sad, neutral, happy) while fixation duration was recorded using eye-tracking. A mixed-design ANOVA showed a significant main effect on emotion. Infants looked longer at fearful expressions than at neutral expressions, while angry and sad expressions did not differ from neutral. A paired-samples t-test was conducted and showed that infants looked longer at fearful faces compared to at angry faces, indicating that different...Show moreInfants' heightened response to negative emotions is thought to be an important element in the development of attentional biases to threat. The current study examined whether infants display a bias toward negative emotions, whether fearful expressions elicit a stronger attentional response compared to angry expressions, and whether age moderates the differences in responses. A cross-sectional sample consisting of 222 infants (5- to 7- month-old, n = 77; 11- to 13- month-olds, n = 78; 17- to 19- month-olds, n = 67) viewed dynamic facial expressions (angry, fearful, sad, neutral, happy) while fixation duration was recorded using eye-tracking. A mixed-design ANOVA showed a significant main effect on emotion. Infants looked longer at fearful expressions than at neutral expressions, while angry and sad expressions did not differ from neutral. A paired-samples t-test was conducted and showed that infants looked longer at fearful faces compared to at angry faces, indicating that different threat-relevant emotions elicit different responses from infants. Although fixation duration increased for each emotion with age, age did not moderate the differences in response between those emotions. These findings taken together provide evidence that heightened attention to fearful facial expressions is already present at 6 months of age and remains stable to at least 18 months of age. The results expand on the current theoretical accounts which propose that an attentional bias toward fear emerges early in life. Implications on current developmental models on threat processing and future research are examined in the discussion.Show less

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Negativity Bias in Early Childhood: Fear Versus Anger, Which Is More Potent?