Attachment

Question 1

What is infancy?

Answer 1

The period of a child’s life before speech begins

Question 2

What is one key interaction between caregivers and infants?

Answer 2

Non-verbal communication

Question 3

Define reciprocity

Answer 3

Reciprocity is responding to the action of another with a similar action, where the actions of one partner elicits a response from the other partner. A kind of conversation

Question 4

Which study demonstrated reciprocity?

Answer 4

Jaffe et al

Question 5

What does Brazelton say about reciprocity?

Answer 5

It lays the foundation for later attachment between caregiver and infant

Question 6

Define interactional synchrony

Answer 6

When two people interact and mirror each other in terms of their facial and body movements

Question 7

Describe one study into interactional synchrony

Answer 7

• Meltzoff and Moore
• Conducted the first systematic study of IS
• Found that infants as young as 2 to 3 weeks old imitated specific facial expressions
• They used an adult model who displayed one of three facial expressions:
  
  • Tongue protruding
  • Lip protruding
  • Mouth open
• A dummy was placed in the infants mouth during the initial display to prevent any response
• Following the display, the dummy was removed and the child’s expression was filmed on a video
• They found that there was an association between the infant behaviour and that of the adult model
• In a later study, they demonstrated the same synchrony with infants only 3 days old

Question 8

Evaluate Meltzoff and Moore’s study

Answer 8

• Piaget believed that true imitation only developed towards the end of the first year and anything before this was a kind of response training “pseudo imitation”. What the infant is doing is repeating behaviour that was rewarded
• Murray and Trevarthen conducted a study with 2 month old infants. The infants first interacted with their mother live then then the via a recorded tape so the image on the screen was not responding to the infants facial and bodily gestures. The infants tried to attract their mothers’ interest but, gaining no response, turned away. This showed that the infant is actively eliciting a response rather than displaying a response that has been rewarded
• There are difficulties in reliably testing infant behaviour. Infants’ mouths are in fairly constant motion and the expressions that are testes occur frequently. This makes it difficult to distinguish between general activity and specific imitated behaviour
• Koepke et al failed to replicate Meltzoff and Moore’s findings
• Marian et al replicated the study by Murray and Trevarthen and found that infants couldn’t distinguish live from videotaped interactions with their mothers. This suggests that the infants are actually not responding to the adult