title: Reduced Face Preference in Infancy: A Developmental Precursor to Callous-Unemotional Traits?
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Children with callous-unemotional (CU) traits, a proposed precursor to adult psychopathy, are characterized by impaired emotion recognition, reduced responsiveness to others' distress, and a lack of guilt or empathy. Reduced attention to faces, and more specifically to the eye region, has been proposed to underlie these difficulties, although this has never been tested longitudinally from infancy. Attention to faces occurs within the context of dyadic caregiver interactions, and early environment including parenting characteristics has been associated with CU traits. The present study tested whether infants' preferential tracking of a face with direct gaze and levels of maternal sensitivity predict later CU traits.
  
  
  METHODS
  Data were analyzed from a stratified random sample of 213 participants drawn from a population-based sample of 1233 first-time mothers. Infants' preferential face tracking at 5 weeks and maternal sensitivity at 29 weeks were entered into a weighted linear regression as predictors of CU traits at 2.5 years.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Controlling for a range of confounders (e.g., deprivation), lower preferential face tracking predicted higher CU traits (p = .001). Higher maternal sensitivity predicted lower CU traits in girls (p = .009), but not boys. No significant interaction between face tracking and maternal sensitivity was found.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This is the first study to show that attention to social features during infancy as well as early sensitive parenting predict the subsequent development of CU traits. Identifying such early atypicalities offers the potential for developing parent-mediated interventions in children at risk for developing CU traits.
authors.affiliation: Biostatistics Department, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London, London. Electronic address: rachael.bedford@kcl.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Rachael
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Bedford
authors.affiliation: Biostatistics Department, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London, London.
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Pickles
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychology, Health and Society, University of Liverpool, Liverpool.
authors.forename: Helen
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Sharp
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychology, Health and Society, University of Liverpool, Liverpool.
authors.forename: Nicola
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Wright
authors.affiliation: Centre for Developmental Science and Disorders, University of Manchester, Manchester, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Jonathan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hill
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000987:Antisocial Personality Disorder / Q000209:etiology / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention; D002657:Child Development; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004644:Emotions; D005133:Eye Movements; D005145:Face; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D009034:Mother-Child Relations / Q000523:psychology*; D012919:Social Behavior; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Callous-unemotional traits; Face preference; Infant development; Maternal sensitivity; Precursor; Psychopathy