Caregiver-infant interactions

Caregiver-infant interactions

1. Meltzoff and Moore

   • If an adult smiles at a baby the baby will smile back
   • A controlled observation where 4 different stimuli (3 faces and a hand gesture) were shown to a baby
     • To record observations an observer watched video tapes of the infants behaviour in real time, slow motion and frame by frame
       • The video was judged by indepentant observers who didn't know what the baby had seen and were asked to note all tongue protrusions and head movements
         • Each observer scored the tapes twice so both observer reliability could be calculated
           • All scores were greater than .92
           • Inter-observer reliability

2. Attachment

   • An emotional bond between two people
     • It's a two way process that endures over time
       • It leads to a certain behaviour such as clinging and proximity seeking and serves the function of protecting an infant

3. Reciprocity

   • Responding to the action of another with a similar action where the actions of one partner elicits a response from the other partner
     • The responses are not necessarily similar as in interactional synchrony

4. Interactional synchrony

   • When two people interact they tend to mirror what the other is doing in terms of their facial and body movements
     • This includes imitating emotions as well as behaviour described as synchrony

5. Evaluation

   • Problems with testing infant behaviour
     • Infants mouths/heads are in constant movement
       • But M & M overcame this by asking observers who didn't know what the infants were imitating
   • Individual differences
     • More strongly attached infant-career pairs had greater interactional synchrony
   • Explains how children begin to understand others
   • Is the behaviour intentional?
     • Tested how they responded to inanimate objects
       • Made little response
         • Shows don't just imitate anything but a specific social response
   • The value of the research
     • Explains how children begin to understand how others think and feel