Infancy - Emotional and Social Foundations

Infancy: Emotional & Social Foundations

Doug Girard, M.S.Loyola University Maryland

Emotional Foundations

Emotions

Primary emotions• Anger• Fear• Disgust• Surprise• Happiness

Secondary emotions• Embarrassment• Guilt• Shame

Emotional Expression

Emotional Expression

• Timeline– Early weeks• Distress, Interest, Pleasure

– First few months• Distress Anger, Sadness, Fear• Interest Surprise• Pleasure Happiness

Anger

• Timeline– 1mo: Undifferentiated distress, angry cry– 4mo: Facial expression of anger– 7mo: Clear anger

• Triggers– Intentions are thwarted

Sadness

• Timeline– Rare in the 1st year of life– Exception: Children of depressed mothers

• Triggers– Infant sadness is a response to maternal sadness

Fear

• Timeline– 6mo: Facial expression of fear

• Triggers– Sudden, unexpected movement– Stranger anxiety

Surprise

• Timeline– 6mo: Open mouth, raised eyebrows

• Triggers– Something that violates expectations

Happiness

• Timeline– 1mo: Smile in response to sensory experiences– 3mo: Social smile when interacting with others– 4mo: Laughter

Emotional Perception

Auditory Perception

• Timeline– 0wk: Emotional contagion• Cry when other infants cry

Visual Perception

• Timeline– 2wk: Hard to perceive others emotions

• Vision still poor, Only look at facial boundaries/edges

– 3mo: Can discern happy, sad, and angry faces– 3mo: Distressed by still faces (emotionless)– 9mo: Social referencing

• If mom likes X, so will the infant• If mom dislikes X, the infant will avoid it

The Still Face Experiment

Social Foundations

In Developing Nations

• Patterns– 0mo: Mother and infant never apart– 6mo: Care delegated to older girls

• Infants are among many people• Infants are held/carried almost constantly• Fathers are often remote/absent in the first year

In the West

• Patterns– Nuclear family– Sleep in a separate room from birth– Mother and infant are alone for most of the day– The infant may be left in a crib/seat for significant periods– Fathers relatively more involved

Theories of Social Development

• Erikson’s Psychosocial Stages of Development• Attachment theory

Theories of Social Development

• Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development– “Trust vs. Mistrust” is the developmental challenge in

infancy– Infants are born entirely dependent on others– They need someone they can reliably trust for food,

warmth, protection, and love– Basic trust in the social world generalizes from these early

experiences of trust or mistrust

Theories of Social Development

• Attachment Theory– Children need a primary caregiver with sensitive

responsiveness for social and emotional development to proceed normally

– The infant uses this attachment figure as a secure base to explore from and return to

– The caregiver’s responses create internal working models that guide the child’s perceptions, emotions, thoughts, and expectations in later relationships

Attachment Theory

Attachment Theory

• Key Contributors– Konrad Lorenz– Harry Harlow– John Bowlby– Mary Ainsworth– Mary Main– Allan Schore

Lorenz• Imprinting

– Time-sensitive attachment behavior– Lorenz demonstrated geese imprint on the first moving stimulus they

see within a “critical period” (13-16 hours after hatching)– Goslings could even imprint on Lorenz himself!

Harlow

• The Wire Mother Experiments– Demonstrated attachment is not based on food, as was

previously thought• Gave young rhesus monkeys a choice between two

different “mothers,” one made of soft terrycloth who provided no food and the other made of wire who provided food in a bottle

– Monkeys spent almost all time with the cloth mother– When scared, monkeys would return to the cloth mother– When the cloth mother was removed, the monkeys’ health

deteriorated

Harlow

Bowlby

• Deprivation Studies– Observed that hospitalized children separated from their

parents went on to develop significant problems– Orphans completely deprived of maternal attachment

would become anaclitically depressed and eventually die due to lack of interest in food

– Saw attachment as an innate survival mechanism

Ainsworth

• The “Strange Situation”– An experiment to assess the attachment style between

mother and child– Believed that a mother’s sensitive response to her child

(attunement) determines the attachment style:• Secure attachment• Insecure-avoidant attachment• Anxious-ambivalent attachment• Disorganized attachment

Ainsworth

Ainsworth

Main

• Adult Attachment Inventory– Used to assess attachment patterns in adults– Finding: Childhood attachment styles persist into

adulthood!

Schore

• Neuroscience– Sees attachment as a co-regulating system

• The mother regulates the child• The child regulates the mother

– Proper brain development depends on attachment• “The Effects of Poor Attachment on Brain Development”

Schore

Infancy: Emotional & Social Foundations

Doug Girard, M.S.Loyola University Maryland