Changing patterns of infant behavior and mother–infant interaction: Intra- and interindividual variability

Mother–infant dyads were observed weekly at their homes for a 15-month period. In this way longitudinal data about the infants’ crying, fretting/fussing, smiling and different types of physical contact with the mother were collected. The subject of this study concerns the variability and stability in macroscopic patterns of associations between these behaviors. Different types of associations were found between the behaviors, and most of them changed considerably as the infant developed. Individual differences in the nature of the associations and in the changes they underwent over time predominated, but in a limited number of cases the infants shared the same developmental trajectories of behavioral associations. The results show how the use of intensive time series designs can be advantageous in clarifying issues of long-term variability and stability in human behavior. They also support the notion of changing patterns of behavior being a normal feature of early development.     

Mother and infant coordinate heart rhythms through episodes of interaction synchrony

Animal studies demonstrated the powerful impact of maternal-infant social contact on the infant's physiological systems, yet the online effects of social interactions on the human infant's physiology remain poorly understood. Mothers and their 3-month old infants were observed during face-to-face interactions while cardiac output was collected from mother and child. Micro-analysis of the partners’ behavior marked episodes of gaze, affect, and vocal synchrony. Time-series analysis showed that mother and infant coordinate heart rhythms within lags of less than 1 s. Bootstrapping analysis indicated that the concordance between maternal and infant biological rhythms increased significantly during episodes of affect and vocal synchrony compared to non-synchronous moments. Humans, like other mammals, can impact the physiological processes of the attachment partner through the coordination of visuo-affective social signals.     

Breastfeeding and the mother–infant relationship—A review

A positive effect of breastfeeding on the mother–infant relationship is often assumed in the scientific literature, but this has not been systematically reviewed. This review aims to clarify the role of breastfeeding in the mother–infant relationship, which is conceptualized as the maternal bond toward the infant and infant attachment toward the mother. Our findings indicate that theoretical mechanisms through which breastfeeding may enhance the maternal bond or infant attachment (i.e., endocrine and sensory factors involved in breastfeeding) can be found in both humans and animal models. However, the few empirical studies investigating this association have not found convincing support for a relation between breastfeeding and the quality of the mother–infant relationship. We therefore conclude that assumptions on a positive role of breastfeeding on the mother–infant relationship are not supported by empirical evidence, and recommendation of breastfeeding should solely be based on its well-documented positive effects on infant and maternal health.     

Infant irritability and early mother–infant reciprocity patterns

This study investigated how various forms of neonatal irritability (at 3 days) and irritability at 10 weeks are related to reciprocal interactions between mothers and their infants. Fifty‐six fullterm, first‐born male infants were examined using the Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale (NBAS‐K) at 3 days postpartum. Each infant was rated for irritability to aversive stimuli, general irritability, consolability and responsiveness to visual–auditory stimuli. At 10 weeks of age, during a home visit, mother–infant reciprocity was scored for gaze, smile, vocalization and hold behaviors. Based upon maternal reports and behavioral observations, infant irritability was scored at 10 weeks using the NBAS‐K scoring system. Findings revealed that: (1) there were two distinct forms of reciprocity: social and physical; (2) general irritability at 3 days was negatively related to reciprocal hold interaction and positively related to reciprocal social interaction at 10 weeks, and (3) neonatal irritability to aversive stimuli (at 3 days) was positively related to subsequent reciprocal social interaction. Regression analyses showed that neonatal variables were the foremost predictors of reciprocal hold at 10 weeks. Findings are discussed in terms of (1) the need to differentiate between social and physical behavioral patterns, and (2) time‐lag effects with respect to mother–infant interactions. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Perceived mother‐infant relationship difficulties in postnatal depression

Postnatal depression has been associated with mother–infant relationship difficulties, but there has been less research in clinical populations. This study aims to identify characteristics of reported mother–infant relationship difficulties in mothers with postnatal depression who had been referred to a tertiary Mother and Baby Service. Forty‐one mothers with postnatal depression completed self‐report and interview measures with regards to their mental state, social adversity, and perceptions on their relationship with their infants. Almost one‐third of mothers (31.7%) reported severe difficulties, including rejection of the infant and maternal pathological anger. A low birth weight and maternal dissatisfaction towards their social role were found to be significantly related to perceived mother–infant interaction difficulties. Self‐reports correlated satisfactorily with interview schedules. A significant proportion of mothers reported difficulties in relating to their infants which can be reliably identified by means of the self‐report measures used. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Infant touching behaviour during mother–infant face‐to‐face interactions

The study of infant communication during mother–infant interactions has largely focused on infants' distal behaviours, while neglecting their more proximal behaviours, such as touch. Yet, touch is an important modality through which infants and mothers communicate; it is also a vital means through which infants self‐regulate and explore their surroundings. The present study was designed to investigate the touching behaviours of 44, 51/2‐month‐old, healthy, full‐term infants during face‐to‐face mother–infant interactions. A still‐face (SF) procedure was used in order to examine differences in the types and locations of infant touch across normal and perturbed interaction periods, when mothers exhibit changes in their emotional availability. Results revealed that infant touch varied with changes in maternal availability. During the SF period, when mothers were unavailable, infants used more active, soothing, and reactive tactile behaviours (stroke, finger, pat, and pull), and they spent more time touching themselves. In contrast, infants used mostly passive touch (static) during the Normal periods, when their mothers were available. They also spent a significant portion of time touching their mothers. The variations in infant touch across periods suggest that infants communicate their affective states through touch. The findings also support the regulatory and exploratory roles of infant touch, especially during periods of maternal unavailability. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The mediating role of maternal responsiveness in some longer term effects of postnatal depression on infant development

We hypothesized a mediating role for low maternal responsiveness in certain child developmental deficits found previously to be associated with postnatal depression. Forty depressed inpatients and 48 control (non-depressed) mothers and their infants were followed until 42 months postpartum. Mother–infant interactions were impaired at 6 months postpartum in the depressed group. Subsequent cognitive deficits were found in children's Full Scale IQ on the Wechsler Preschool Primary Scale of Intelligence (Revised) at 42 months of age. Statistical modeling of the mediation hypothesis confirmed that these effects were overwhelmingly explained by lowered maternal responsiveness at 6 months. Similarly, increased temperamental difficulties were apparent in children of depressed mothers but were not correlated with maternal responsiveness. Male infants of depressed mothers were disproportionately vulnerable (compared to females) to impaired cognitive abilities associated with maternal depression. The data concur with previous work and provide empirical support for the theoretical prediction that early disturbances of the mother–infant interaction will mediate some developmental deficits in the children of depressed mothers.     

Child's behaviour in mother–child interaction predicts later emotional and behavioural problems

The aims were to examine the association of maternal or child interactive behaviour with emotional and behavioural problems of the child simultaneously and 3 years later, and to assess whether there is continuity in children's emotional and behavioural symptoms from 2 to 5 years. Sixty‐five 2‐year‐old children with their mothers were videotaped during a feeding situation. Their mothers completed the CBCL at 2 years and when the children were 5. Simultaneously, there were no strong correlations between child's emotional and behavioural problems and maternal or child interactive behaviour. Subsequently, mothers' higher sensitivity and more optimal structuring, as well as child's higher involvement of the mother, were associated with lower levels of child externalizing and total problem scores. Also, less responsive children showed more externalizing symptoms 3 years later. There was continuity of emotional and behavioural problems from 2 to 5 years. Problems in mother–child interaction may predict behavioural problems in the child subsequently. Besides maternal behaviour, it is important to consider the interactive behaviour of the child. Children who are less responsive and who show less involvement of the mother are more likely to subsequently present more externalizing symptoms, and these children should be recognized and treated early. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Transferences in parent–infant psychoanalytic treatments

In parent–infant treatments, babies sometimes exhibit symptoms such as screaming, clinging, and fearful gaze avoidance of the analyst. The paper investigates if such phenomena may be regarded as transference manifestations, and if so, if they appear both in younger and older infants. Based on three case presentations, it is concluded that some babies are capable of forming both brief and enduring transferences. The term “indirect infant transference” refers to when a baby reacts emotionally to the analyst as long as the parent's transference remains unresolved. “Direct transference” refers to when a baby reacts in a non‐mediated way to the analyst. The necessary tool of investigation for discovering these phenomena is a psychoanalytic method with an explicit, though not exclusive, focus on the baby. Discerning them in the clinical encounter may help us understand the baby's predicament and when and how to address the baby or the parent. These treatments constitute an empirical field awaiting more extensive clinical and theoretical investigation. Already now, they suggest that transference may be rooted in, and may appear during, very early developmental stages. The paper's positions are compared with those put forward by other parent‐infant clinicians.     

Simulating mother–child interaction: exploring two varieties of a non‐linear dynamic systems approach1

In theoretical analyses of early mother–child interaction, it has been argued that interaction should be studied in its flow over time, and that the behaviour of each interactant is likely to be non‐linearly determined. The mother–child dyad can be seen as a non‐linear dynamic system, the development of which is determined by the mutual relations between its elements. The present study is based on the idea that computer simulations can be used to find out what kind of empirical implication these ideas have. Accordingly, we describe two non‐linear dynamic systems‐based models for simulating mother–child interaction, i.e. a connectionist network model and a logistic growth model. Three determinants of the nature of the interaction, i.e. the child's irritability, the mother's sensitive responsiveness, and the intensity of an external stressor bothering the child, are varied systematically. Although the results of both simulations differed considerably, they shared the fact that small changes in stressor intensity produced abrupt changes from one type of interaction to another. In addition, increasing stressor intensity sometimes had the paradoxical effect of resulting in less, rather than more, distress on the side of the child. Though irritability and responsiveness were varied in a less fine‐grained way than stressor intensity, the results suggest that similarly small differences in these dimensions at different parts of the dimension's scale range have differentially strong effects on the nature of the interaction. It is concluded that these simulations help us to specify the nature of empirically researchable phenomena that are to be expected, given the assumptions listed above. Further elaboration of the models and comparison with longitudinal empirical data is needed to answer further theoretical and practical questions. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Observer Influences on Fathers and Mothers: An Experimental Manipulation of the Structure and Function of Parent – Infant Conversation

From studies over the past 20 years four contrasting hypotheses can be made about the nature of parent–infant communication: (1) mothers and fathers display similar skills to their infants and do not exert a differential influence on their development; (2) fathers are less sympathetic to their infants' level of development and therefore inadvertently stretch the child's development more than mothers; (3) both parents differentially socialize their sons' and daughters' early communicative skills; (4) any apparent differences between parents reflect their expectations about being observed. To examine these hypotheses together, this experiment records the communication of 10 mother–infant and 10 father–infant dyads in two conditions: when an observer was present or absent. The analysis revealed two patterns. Firstly, in keeping with most research on parent–child communication, mothers and fathers both simplified their speech to their infants in similar ways. Secondly, both the structure and function of parental communication showed differences between the two conditions and many of these differences were moderated by interactions between condition and sex of parent or child. The data thus provide more support for the first and fourth hypotheses cited above. It is suggested that analyses of parent–infant interaction should move away from simple assumptions about parental ‘influences’ upon children's development to consider the subtleties of different parental styles in different settings.     

Improving mother–child interaction in low‐income Turkish–Dutch families: A study of mechanisms mediating improvements resulting from participating in a home‐based preschool intervention program

This study examined whether the effects on cognitive and language outcomes of a recently developed home‐based educational intervention program, Opstap Opnieuw, for 4–6‐years‐old disadvantaged children could be explained by improved mother–child interaction. The present sample (n=30) was drawn from a larger sample of Turkish–Dutch families (n=181) for which in a previous study significant effects of Opstap Opnieuw were found on children's (first) language and cognitive pre‐math skill, 5 months after the program ended. The present study focused on two facets of interaction quality as possible mediators of these program effects: the mean cognitive distancing level of mothers' communication and instruction behaviour as an indicator of the cognitive and verbal stimulation provided, and the degree of cooperation as an indicator of mothers' social‐emotional support to their children. Both measures were based on systematic observation of mother–child interaction during sorting tasks. Participation in the program appeared to improve mothers' social‐emotional support behaviour substantially, but not their cognitive distancing behaviour. For Turkish (first language) vocabulary, about half of the program effect appeared to be mediated by the improved social‐emotional support. For cognitive pre‐mathematical skills, two‐thirds of the program effect appeared to be mediated by improved social‐emotional support. Mothers' cognitive distancing was moderately‐strongly related to children's vocabulary development, but did not mediate program effects. Some implications of the results are discussed. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Quantitative evaluation of infant behaviour and mother–infant interaction: An overview of a japanese interdisciplinary programme of research

This paper provides an overview of an interdisciplinary programme of research started more than 20 years ago at the University of Tokyo. A major aim of this programme was (and still is) to develop methods and related forms of quantitative analysis that provide rigorous evaluations of infant behaviour from a particular theoretical perspective. In one part of the programme telethermography is used to measure emotional changes in young infants. Contrary to the accepted view in attachment theory, infants as young as 2–3 months showed evidence of stress following separation from the mother (as indexed by a drop in the skin temperature of the infant's forehead). In another part, we established the presence of interpersonal synchrony between arm movements of the newborn and the speech of the mother and other adults, using computer assisted pattern recognition techniques. On the basis of this finding, we have proposed a simulation model of mother-infant interaction from the perspective of system information theory. In general, our programme of research provides a theoretically driven set of techniques and analytical approaches that may provide deeper insights into early development and parenting.     

Honesty–humility and a person–situation interaction at work

Person–situation interactions have attracted researchers' attention for decades. Likewise, the current work focuses on the interaction of honesty–humility and situational conditions in bringing about counterproductive work behaviour (CWB). As such, we introduce perceptions of organizational politics as a situational construct representing an opportunity for CWB. In a sample of N = 148 employees we found that particularly individuals low in honesty–humility were affected by situational circumstances. By contrast, those high in honesty–humility reported practically the same (lower) amount of CWB independent of the level of perceptions of organizational politics. In other words, employees low in honesty–humility were especially likely to condition their behaviour on environmental factors, a result that mirrors previous findings. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The co‐construction of joint action between mothers and 2–4‐month‐old infants: the mother's role

The purpose of this longitudinal study was to describe object‐centred interactions between mothers and their 2–4‐month‐old infants, before and during the emergence of reaching and grasping movements. We hypothesized that when reaching movements emerge at around 3 months, mothers alternate between attention stimulation and reaching stimulation, before joint actions between mother and infant develop around objects. Twelve dyads were recorded when infants were 2 months, 3 months and 4 months. The interactive sessions lasted 5 min. Three age‐appropriate toys the infant could handle were available to the mother. A principal component analysis (PCA) was performed on verbal and non‐verbal maternal behaviours, motor infant behaviours and co‐occurrences of those behaviours. The developmental course of prehension in infants when playing with their mother follows similar pathways, as was described when they are observed alone. Mothers appeared to early scaffold prehension skills by verbal and non‐verbal means. Moreover, maternal behaviours change according to the infant's behaviour, and conversely, infant's behaviours influence maternal behaviours: mother plays first an active part in joint action, while later on, the infant achieves joint action when motor skills develop. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Adding “Circle of Security – Parenting” to treatment as usual in three Swedish infant mental health clinics. Effects on parents’ internal representations and quality of parent‐infant interaction

This study presents effects of adding Circle of Security‐Parenting (COS ‐P) to an already established comprehensive therapeutic model for early parent‐child intervention in three Swedish infant mental health (IMH ) clinics. Parents’ internal representations and quality of parent‐infant interaction were studied in a clinical sample comprised of 52 parent‐infant dyads randomly allocated to two comparable groups. One group consisted of 28 dyads receiving treatment as usual (TAU ) supplemented with COS ‐P in a small group format, and another group of 24 dyads receiving TAU only. Assessments were made at baseline (T1), 6 months after inclusion (T2) and 12 months after inclusion (T3). Changes over time were explored in 42 dyads. In the COS ‐P group, the proportion of balanced representations, as assessed with Working Model of the Child Interview (WMCI ), significantly increased between T1 and T3. Further, the proportion of emotionally available interactions, as assessed with Emotional Availability scales (EA ), significantly increased over time in the COS ‐P group. Improvements in the TAU ‐group were close to significant. Limitations of the study are mainly related to the small sample size. Strength is the real world character of the study, where COS ‐P was implemented in a clinical context not otherwise adapted to research. We conclude by discussing the value of supplementing TAU with COS ‐P in IMH treatment.     

Bidirectional influences in mother–toddler dyads: an examination of the relative influence of mothers' and children's behaviours

This study examined bidirectional relationship between mothers' lax and overreactive discipline and children's misbehaviour and negative effect. We examined the moment‐to‐moment stability of mothers' and children's behaviours (actor effects) and mothers' and children's influence on their partners' subsequent behaviours (partner effects). Participants were 71 mothers and their 24‐ to 48‐month‐old children observed during a 30‐min interaction. Both children and mothers exhibited stability in their own behaviours and influenced the subsequent behaviours of their partners. Additionally, a comparison of partner effects indicated that overreactive discipline more strongly predicted child's negative effect than child's negative effect predicted overreactive discipline. In contrast, although a child's negative effect predicted lax discipline, lax discipline did not predict subsequent child's negative effect. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.