Caregiver-infant interactions

• Infancy


  The period in a child's life before speech begins
• Infancy


  • Usually refers to the child's first year of life
  • Interactions between an infant and their caregiver are non-verbal
  • These non-verbal interactions form the basis of attachment between an infant and their caregiver
• Non-verbal communication between an infant and their caregiver

  • Reciprocity
  • Interactional synchrony
• Reciprocity


  Reciprocal interactions are two-way interactions
• Caregiver-infant interactions are reciprocal
• Both the caregiver and the infant are active contributors in reciprocal interactions
• They take turns to elicit responses from each other
• If the infant smiles it will trigger a response in the caregiver, which will then trigger a response in the infant
• Interactional synchrony


  When two people interact, they tend to mirror each other in terms of their actions and emotions
• Research has demonstrated interactional synchrony in caregiver-infant interactions
• Research into interactional synchrony: Meltzoff & Moore (1977)

  1. Exposed two to three week old infants to an adult model

  2. The adult model displayed one of three facial expressions

  3. A dummy was placed in the infants mouth during the display

  4. Following the display, the dummy was removed and the infant's response was filmed on video
• They found that the infants often mirrored the facial expression displayed by the adult model
• These findings demonstrate interactional synchrony in caregiver-infant interactions
• One weakness is that other studies have failed to replicate the findings of Meltzoff & Moore (1977). For example, a study by Koepke et al. (1983) failed to find any evidence of interactional synchrony in caregiver-infant interactions. This suggests that research into interactional synchrony lacks external reliability.
• There are problems with research into interactional synchrony. For example, infants’ mouths are in fairly constant motion and the expressions that are tested (e.g. sticking tongue out) occur frequently. This means that it is difficult to distinguish between general activity and specific imitated behaviour. This suggests that the internal validity of research into interactional synchrony is low.
• One strength is that there is evidence to support the role of interactional synchrony in the development of attachment bonds. For example, Isabella et al. (1989) observed 30 mothers and infants and assessed the degree of interactional synchrony. They also assessed the quality of mother-infant attachment and found that those with higher levels of synchrony had better quality mother-infant attachments. This suggests that interactional synchrony is important for the development of good quality attachments bonds.