The neuropsychology of infants’ pro-social preferences

•Neural correlates of 6-month-old infants’ detection of pro-social agents.•ERP component P400 over posterior temporal areas index social valence.•First non-behavioral demonstration of pro-social preferences in young infants.

ABSTRACTThe current study is the first to investigate neural correlates of infants’ detection of pro- and antisocial agents. Differences in ERP component P400 over posterior temporal areas were found during 6-month-olds’ observation of helping and hindering agents (Experiment 1), but not during observation of identically moving agents that did not help or hinder (Experiment 2). The results demonstrate that the P400 component indexes activation of infants’ memories of previously perceived interactions between social agents. This leads to suggest that similar processes might be involved in infants’ processing of pro- and antisocial agents and other social perception processes (encoding gaze direction, goal directed grasping and pointing).