Caregiver-Infant Interactions Flashcards
What is attachment?
A close, two-way emotional bond between two people, where each person feels more secure in the presence of their counterpart.
What is proximity?
Staying close to whoever one is attached to.
What is separation distress?
Distress when an attachment figure leaves.
What is stranger anxiety?
Distress at the presence of strangers.
What is reciprocity?
A social norm of responding to a positive action with another positive action.
Reciprocity helps to ________ an attachment bond.
Fortify.
How did Tronik (1975) study reciprocity?
Still face study: asked mothers who had enjoyed a dialogue with their babies to stop moving and maintain a ‘still face’.
Babies tempted the mother into interaction by smiling.
They became distressed when their smile didn’t provoke the ‘usual’ response.
What is interactional synchrony?
How one mirrors the actions of another person. Interaction is rhythmic as the infant and caregiver’s interactions are synchronised.
Interactional synchrony helps to ________ an attachment bond.
Reinforce.
How did Meltzoff & Moore (1977) study interactional synchrony?
An adult model displayed specific facial expressions to infants (2-3 weeks old). A dummy was initially placed in the infant’s mouth to prevent an initial reaction.
After the display, the dummy was removed and the baby’s reaction was recorded.
Infants imitated the adult’s facial expressions, implying that the ability to mirror is an innate behaviour.
What is an example of reciprocity?
A smile from one triggers a smile from the other.
What is an example of interactional synchrony?
Carer and infant mirroring each other’s actions.
What are advantages to caregiver-infant interaction?
-Well-controlled procedures, with both mother and infant being filmed from multiple angles. This ensures that very fine details of behavior can be recorded and later analysed.
-Babies don’t know or care that they are being observed, so their behavior does not change.
-Face validity: we learn at a young age how to interact with others for our own survival.
What are disadvantages to caregiver-infant interaction?
-Reliability of testing infants (ambiguity on whether they’re engaging in interactional synchrony or reciprocity, and whether the behaviour occurred by chance).
-The camera may have had an effect on the infants, as it may have been intrusive and noisy.
What is secure base attachment?
Where one would explore the environment but return to attachment figure for comfort.
