ATTACHMENT: Caregiver-infant interactions in humans: reciprocity and interactional synchrony Flashcards
from the start babies have
meaningful social interactions w their caregivers
What do psychologists think about the meaningful social interactions babies have with their caregivers
interactions have important functions for a child’s social development
What are good quality early social interactions associated with
successful development attahcmnets
between babies & caregivers
From birth what do ababies and mothers spend a lot of time in
highly pleasurable interactions
an interaction shows reciprocity when
each person responds to each other
and elicits a response from them
Give an example of reciprocity
a baby smiles
adult responds by saying something
this in turn causes a response from the baby
reciprical interactions aka
turn taking
Why is reciprocal interaction essential in anyb conversation
people will talk over each other
babys have periodic …..
alert phases
What do baabies signal during periodic alert phases
they are readu for interaction e.g through eye contact
how often do mothers pick up on their babies alertness and who dcarried out this research
2/3s of the time
feldman and eidelman
mothers pick up on their abbies alertness 2/3s of the time why would this vary
external factors such as stress
From around 3 months what happens to the periodic alert phases and what does it involve
more frequent
involves both mother and baby paying close attention to each othr signals - verbal and facila expressions
How have traditional views of childhood portrayed babaies
passicve role recieving care from adult
T/F babies and caregivers play an active role
TRUE
Both caregivers and babies do what
and how do they split this inbetween them
initiate interactions
they take turns
Who describe interactions between babies and caregivers as a dance
Brazelton
Why did Brazelton call itneractins between adult and babies a dance
like a couples dance where each partner responds to the others moves
What is Interactional Synchrony
caregiver and baby interact in way actions and emotions mirror each other
What did Meltzoff and Moore observe
beginnings of interactional synchrony in babies as young as two weeks old
Explain what meltzoff and moore did
adult displayed 1/3 gestures or facial expressions
babaies response
filmed and labelled by the independent observers
What did Meltzoff and Moore find?
babies expressions and gestures
more likley to mirror those of adults:
more than chance would predict so there was a significant association
Interactional synchrony is important for the development of
caregiver- infant attachment
What did Isabella et al observe
30 mums and babies
What 2 things did Isabella et al researchers assess of the 30 mums and babies
the degree of synchrony
and
the quality of the baby mother attachment
What did Isabella et al find
high levels of syn chrony associated with better quality mother - baby attachment
strength 0 filmed obsv / high control
caregiver-infant interactions are usually filmed in a laboratory
means that other activity, that might distract a baby, can be controlled
and
observations can be recorded and analysed later
therefore it’s unlikely that researchers will miss seeing key behaviours
more than one observer can record data and establish the inter-rater reliability of observations
babies don’t know they’re being observed, so their behaviour doesn’t change in response to observation
therefore data collected in such research should have good relativity and validity
limtiation - hard to interpret babies behaviour
hard to interpret a baby’s behaviour
movement being observed are just small hand movements or subtle changes in expression
e.g. it’s difficult to be sure whether a baby is smiling or just passing wind
also difficult to known what is taking place from the baby’s perspective
e.g. we cannot know whether a hand twitch is random or triggered by something the caregiver has done
can’t be certain that the behaviours seen in caregiver-infant interactions have a special meaning
limitation - observing behaviour dont tell us its developmental importance
simply observing a behaviour doesn’t tell us its developmental importance
Feldman points out that ideas like synchrony simply give names to patterns of observable caregiver and baby behaviours
these are robust phenomena in the sense that they can be reliably observed but they still may not be particularly useful in understanding child development as it doesn’t tell use the purpose of the these behaviours
can’t be certain from observational research alone that reciprocity and synchrony are important for a child’s development
