Caregiver-Infant interactions

• What is an attachment?

  An emotional relationship between two people in which seeks closeness and feels more secure when in the presence of the other.
• What does proximity mean in attachment?

  We stay physically close to those we are attached to.
• What is separation anxiety?

  When the attachment figure leaves, high levels of distress are shown.
• What is secure base behaviour?

  Infants regularly return back to their attachment figure whilst playing and exploring.
• Meltzoff and Moore (1977)

  -Aimed to investigate the aim which imitation occurs within and infant.

  -Videotaped 12–21-day old babies as they watched an adult experimenter pull facial expressions.

  -3 facial expressions: Lip protrusion, mouth opening and tongue protrusion.

  -Found that babies as young as 2 weeks would imitate the adults’ facial expressions.
• What is reciprocity?

  Mutual exchange of responses between infant and caregiver, back and fourth communication.
• What is interactional synchrony?

  Temporal coordination between an infant and their caregiver, involves synchrony between infant and caregiver.
• Tronick et al (1979)

  -Still face paradigm.

  -Mother is interacting with baby, and then suddenly asked to stop interacting with child.

  -When child sees mother is not responding they become distressed.

  -Shows the power that reciprocity and interactional synchrony have on the formation of an attachment.
• Isabella and Belsky (1991)

  -Studied 153 first time mothers.

  -First observed them when the child was 3 months old, and then conducted further observations up to 9 months.

  -Found that mother and child that had a secure attachment had interacted in a well timed and mutually rewarding manner.

  -Mother and child attachments that were insecure were less synchronised with each other.

  -Shows that interactional synchrony influences the quality of attachment that develops.
• Meltzoff and Moore: Strengths

  -Highly controlled, recorded from multiple angles.

  -Had another observer who was not aware of the aims of the study.

  -No issues of demand characteristics as working with infants.
• Meltzoff and Moore: Criticisms

  -Intentionality-Difficult to draw conclusions, as difficult to determine the infant’s intention. So, a researcher would need to make an inference.

  -Bias-observe infants’ behaviour and interpret it in a way that fits the aims. This weekends the validity.

  -Practical issues with studying infants-have to wait for a short time period when the infant is not sleeping or crying etc.

  -Can be socially sensitive-could make mothers feel like bad parents.