caregiver infant interactions

• Attachment


  A strong, enduring, emotional and reciprocal bond between two people, especially an infant and caregiver
• Introduction to Attachment


  Wednesday, 8 December 2021
• Caregiver-infant interactions


  • From an early age babies have meaningful social interactions with their carers
  • These interactions have important functions for the child's social development, in particular for the development of caregiver-infant attachment
• Reciprocity


  An interaction is reciprocal when each person responds to the other and elicits and response from them
• Reciprocity


  • Babies have periodic 'alert phases' which signal that they are ready for interaction. Mothers typically pick up on and respond to infant alertness around two-thirds of the time (Feldman and Eidelman, 2007)
  • From around 3 months old, this interaction becomes more frequent and involves close attention to each other's verbal signals and facial expressions (Feldman, 2007)
• Interactional synchrony


  The temporal co-ordination of microlevel social behaviour where mother and infant interact in such a way that their actions and emotions mirror each other
• Interactional synchrony


  • Meltzoff & Moore (1977) observed the beginnings of interactional synchrony in infants as young as two weeks old
  • An adult displayed one of three facial expressions or one of three distinctive gestures. The child's response was filmed and identified by independent observers. An association was found between the expression or gesture the adult has displayed and the actions of the babies
• Interactional synchrony


  It is believed that interactional synchrony is important for the development of mother-infant attachment
• Interactional synchrony


  • Isabella et al. (1989) observed 30 mothers and infants together and assessed the degree of synchrony. They found that high levels of synchrony were associated with better quality mother-infant attachment (e.g. the emotional intensity of the relationship)
• Traditionally, attachment has been thought of in terms of mother-infant attachment
• Attachment figures


  Who infants become attached to
• Attachment figures


  • Schaffer and Emerson (1964) found that the majority of babies did become attached to their mother first (at around 7 months) and within a few weeks or months formed secondary attachment was formed with the father by the age of 18 months
• The role of the father

  Fathers have a different role in attachment - one that is more to do with play and stimulation and less to do with nurturing
• The role of the father

  • Grossman (2002) carried out a longitudinal study looking at both parents' behaviour and how it relates to the quality of children's attachments into their teens. Quality of infant attachment with mothers was related to children's attachment in adolescence suggesting that father attachment was less important. However, the quality of fathers' play with infants was related to the quality of adolescent attachments
• Fathers as primary carers


  • Field (1978) filmed 4-month old babies in face-to-face interaction with (1) primary caregiver mothers, (2) secondary caregivers fathers and (3) primary caregiver fathers. Primary caregiver fathers, like mothers, spent more time smiling, imitating and holding infants than the secondary caregiver fathers - This behaviour appears to be important in building attachment with the infant
• The key to attachment relationship is the level of responsiveness of the parent, not the gender