Caregiver-infant interaction A03

• Strength of research on caregiver-infant interactions


  • Interactions are usually filmed in a laboratory
  • Other activity that might distract a baby can be controlled
  • Observations can be recorded and analysed later
  • More than one observer can record data and establish inter-rater reliability
  • Babies don't know they are being observed, so their behaviour does not change in response to observation
• The data collected in such research should have good reliability and validity
• Difficulty observing babies


  • Young babies lack coordination and much of their bodies are almost immobile
  • Movements being 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 is taking place from the baby's perspective
  • Cannot know whether a movement such as a hand twitch is random or triggered by something the caregiver has done
• Difficulty observing babies means we cannot be certain that the behaviours seen in caregiver-infant interactions have special meaning
• Developmental importance: A further limitation is that simply observing a behaviour does not tell us its developmental importance. Feldman points out that idea like synchrony (and by implication reciprocity) simply give names to patterns of observable aregiver and baby behaviours