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Infants' affective displays with mothers and peers
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INFANTS' AFFECTIVE DISPLAYS WITH MOTHERSAND PEERS Roger Bakeman & Lauren B. Adamson In the work reported here, we sought to document what happens to infants' displays of positive affect as their communication system develops from the predominantly "expressive" face-to-face exchanges of early infancy to the prelinguistic "referential" dialogues of late infancy. Two cohorts of 14 infants each were videotaped in their homes, one at 6, 9, 12, and 15 and one at 9, 12, 15, and 18 months of age, while playing with mothers, with same-aged peers, and alone. Trained observers identified affective displays, by which we mean any sudden increase in the intensity or change in the "hedonic tone" of an infant's actions. They also identified times when infants were engaged just with people and times when iinfants and their partners were j o i n t l y engaged with the same object. Such j o i n t engagement interests us because of its potential for referential communication. Positive affective displays occurred every 27 !seconds, on the average, during person engagement (no difference between mothers and peers), every 37 seconds during j o i n t engagement with mothers, and every 192 seconds otherwise. Infants were j o i n t l y engaged with mothers 28% of the time yet those times accounted for 42% of the affective displays. Other~times when affect was especially l i k e l y included the f i r s t 5 seconds of j o i n t engagement with both mothers and peers and times when mothers acted on objects in repetitive ways. We think these results are consistent with Bruner's notion of a "Scaffolding" role for mothers and with the theorizing of Werner and Kaplan,.who suggest that genetically e a r l i e r means of communication (such as affective displays) w i l l be used to support the emergence of new communicative functions (such as shared reference to objects).
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INFANTS' AFFECTIVE DISPLAYS WITH MOTHERSAND PEERS Roger Bakeman & Lauren B. Adamson In the work reported here, we sought to document what happens to infants' displays of positive affect as their communication system develops from the predominantly "expressive" face-to-face exchanges of early infancy to the prelinguistic "referential" dialogues of late infancy. Two cohorts of 14 infants each were videotaped in their homes, one at 6, 9, 12, and 15 and one at 9, 12, 15, and 18 months of age, while playing with mothers, with same-aged peers, and alone. Trained observers identified affective displays, by which we mean any sudden increase in the intensity or change in the "hedonic tone" of an infant's actions. They also identified times when infants were engaged just with people and times when iinfants and their partners were j o i n t l y engaged with the same object. Such j o i n t engagement interests us because of its potential for referential communication. Positive affective displays occurred every 27 !seconds, on the average, during person engagement (no difference between mothers and peers), every 37 seconds during j o i n t engagement with mothers, and every 192 seconds otherwise. Infants were j o i n t l y engaged with mothers 28% of the time yet those times accounted for 42% of the affective displays. Other~times when affect was especially l i k e l y included the f i r s t 5 seconds of j o i n t engagement with both mothers and peers and times when mothers acted on objects in repetitive ways. We think these results are consistent with Bruner's notion of a "Scaffolding" role for mothers and with the theorizing of Werner and Kaplan,.who suggest that genetically e a r l i e r means of communication (such as affective displays) w i l l be used to support the emergence of new communicative functions (such as shared reference to objects).
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