Frontal Brain Asymmetry Predicts Infants ' Response to Maternal Separation

Examined whether certain features of infant emperament might be related to individual differences in the asymmetry ofresting frontal activation. EEG was recorded from the left and right frontal and parietal scalp regions of 13 normal 10-month-old infants. Infant behavior was then observed during a brief period of maternal separation. Those infants who cried in response tomaternal separation showed greater right frontal activation during the preceding baseline period compared with infants who did not cry. Frontal activation asymmetry may be a state-independent marker for individual differences in threshold of reactivity o stressful events and vulnerability oparticular emotions. In a series of studies, we have recently reported ifferential activation of the cerebral hemispheres during the processing of positive and negative motion in young infants (Davidson & Fox, 1982; Fox & Davidson, 1986, 1987, 1988). Specifically, using electrophysiologieal procedures to infer asymmetric hemispheric activation in response to a wide variety of affect elicitors, we have reported that the left frontal region is rela-tively more active during the expression of certain positive mo-tions and the right frontal region is more active during the ex-pression of certain egative motions ( for reviews, see Davidso