caregiver infant interactions

• what is reciprocity?

  when the caregiver and baby interact by responding to each others signals and each elicits a response from the other
• what is interactional synchrony?

  • when the caregiver and baby interact in a way that their emotions and actions are synchronised 
• what did isabella et al find?

  • while researching 30 mothers and babies that high levels of synchrony were associated with better quality mother-baby attachments
• filmed observations - One strength of the research?

  caregiver-infant interactions filmed in a laboratory. so other activity, that might distract a baby, can be controlled. using films means observations can be recorded and analysed later. unlikely that researchers will miss seeing key behaviours. having filmed interactions means more than one observer can record data and establish inter-rater reliability of observations and babies don't know they're being observed, so their behaviour doesn't change in response to observation.Therefore data collected should have good reliability and validity.
• difficulty observing babies - One limitation of research into caregiver-infant interaction?

  hard to interpret a baby's behaviour.Young babies lack co-ordination and their bodies are almost immobile. movements observed are just small hand movements or subtle changes in expression. difficult to be sure, whether a baby is smiling or just passing wind. difficult to determine what's taking place from baby's perspective. e.g. we can't know whether a movement such as a hand twitch is random or triggered by something caregiver has done. we can't be certain behaviours seen in caregiver-infant interactions have a special meaning.
• developmental importance - A further limitation ?

  simply observing a behaviour does not 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 sense that they can be reliably observed, but still may not be particularly useful in understanding child development as it doesn't tell us purpose of these behaviours. we can't be certain from observational research alone that reciprocity and synchrony are important for a child's development.
• Counterpoint ?

  evidence from other lines of research to suggest that early interactions are important. For example Isabella et al. found that achievement of interactional synchrony predicted development of a good quality attachment. so on balance, caregiver-infant interaction is probably important in development.
• meltzoff and Moore's research into international synchrony?

  observed beginnings of interactional synchrony in babies as young as 2 weeks old. adult displayed one of 3 facial expressions, babies repose filmed and labelled by independent observers. babies expressions and gestures more likely to mirror those of the adults more than chance would predict.