Investigating Neurocognitive and Physiological Synchrony and Covariation in Dyads: Implications for Child and Adolescent Psychopathology

Physiological and neurocognitive synchrony—the real-time alignment of biological or neural activity between individuals within the same temporal and spatial frame—has emerged as a key lens for understanding dynamic processes that shape child and adolescent development. In parent–child, peer, and other dyads, synchrony in heart rate, skin conductance, neural activity (e.g., fMRI, fNIRS, EEG), or emotion-related physiology may represent a mechanism linking moment-to-moment social interaction to long-term developmental outcomes and mental health trajectories.

Complementing this, patterns of covariation—shared variability across individuals in behavioral, affective, neural, or genetic domains—extend this framework beyond temporal synchrony to capture broader inter-individual associations in developmental functioning. Integrating perspectives on gene–environment interplay further deepens our understanding of how dyadic processes intersect with individual susceptibility, resilience, and adaptation across development.

This Research Topic invites empirical and theoretical contributions examining physiological, neurocognitive, and genetic synchrony or covariation in youth and their significant others, with a particular focus on dyads at risk for, or demonstrating, internalizing (e.g., anxiety, depression) and externalizing (e.g., conduct problems, aggression) difficulties. We welcome submissions that elucidate how synchrony and covariation patterns relate to callous–unemotional traits, emotion regulation, aggression, bullying, or resilience; that explore transactional processes between parents and children or peers; or that apply longitudinal, multimodal, or gene–environment approaches to capture complex pathways of risk and adaptation.

By bridging psychophysiology, neurocognition, behavioral genetics, and developmental psychopathology, this Topic aims to advance an integrative understanding of how real-time alignment and broader inter-individual covariation in biological and psychological systems contribute to vulnerability and resilience across diverse developmental trajectories.

Key themes may include, but are not limited to:

• Physiological and neurocognitive synchrony in families and peer dyads: mechanisms and developmental outcomes
• Inter-individual covariation in behavioral, neural, and affective responses across contexts
• Gene–environment interactions shaping synchrony, covariation, and developmental risk
• Transactional models linking synchrony and covariation to internalizing and externalizing disorders
• Links between synchrony, callous–unemotional traits, and conduct problems
• Observational, neuroimaging, experimental, and longitudinal studies of dyadic processes
• Multi-level analyses (behavioral, neurobiological, genetic, contextual moderators)
• Innovations in the conceptualization, measurement, and modeling of synchrony and covariation

Article types and fees

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Classification
• Clinical Trial
• Community Case Study
• Conceptual Analysis
• Curriculum, Instruction, and Pedagogy
• Data Report
• Editorial
• ... View all formats

Articles that are accepted for publication by our external editors following rigorous peer review incur a publishing fee charged to Authors, institutions, or funders.

Article types

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Classification
• Clinical Trial
• Community Case Study
• Conceptual Analysis
• Curriculum, Instruction, and Pedagogy
• Data Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• FAIR² DATA Direct Submission
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• Mini Review
• Opinion
• Original Research
• Perspective
• Policy and Practice Reviews
• Policy Brief
• Review
• Study Protocol
• Systematic Review
• Technology and Code

Keywords: Physiological synchrony, Dyadic interaction, Neurocognitive synchrony, Covariation, Gene–environment interaction, Child development, Adolescent development, Parent–child dyads, Psychopathology, Resilience

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.