1. Chapter 4
Social and Personality Development in
Infancy

2. Forming the Roots of Sociability:
Emotions in Infancy
 Across every culture,
infants show similar facial
expressions relating to
basic emotions.
 Influenced by bio AND
exp.
 E.g., rules of display are
culturally influenced
 Temperament

3. Emergence of Emotional Expressions:
first expression of relationships
• Enables coordinated interactions w/caregivers
• Reciprocal changes in expression
The “self-conscious” emotions (jealousy, empathy,
embarrassment, pride, shame, and guilt) appear later

4. Emergence of Emotional Expressions:
first expression of relationships
Crying: at least three
types:
basic cry
anger cry
pain cry
stimulated by
physical pain
or
high-intensity
stimulus

5. Emergence of Emotional Expressions:
first expression of relationships
Smiling: 2 types:
Reflexive
Social
4 months

6. Separation Anxiety (Protest)
Begins ~ 8 or 9 months; peaks ~14
months. (Slightly later than stranger
anxiety.)
Both stranger & separation anxiety
represent important social progress!
They reflect cognitive advances in
the infant, and growing emotional
and social bonds.
http://media.pearsoncmg.com/ph/hss/shared_hss_assets/psychology/dev_vid/video_pop-ups/feldman_video_06-2.html

7. Separation Anxiety (Protest)
A universal (but slightly varying) phenomenon

8. Social Referencing:
Feeling What Others Feel
Social Referencing>reading emotional cues
to help determine how to act; esp facial
expressions
 First occurs ~8-9 months.
 Most likely >uncertain and ambiguous
situations.
 If Dad and Mom show conflicting emotions?
[next]

9. Temperament
 Chess and Thomas’
Easy - 40%
Difficult - 10%
Slow-to-warm-up - 15%
35% cannot be consistently categorized
 Kagan’s Behavioral Inhibition/socially bold
 Effortful Control > high control = self-
soothing; low control = easily agitated
 Biological foundations and experience

10. The Consequences of Temperament:
Does Temperament Matter?
GOODNESS OF FIT: Development is dependent on the
degree of match between children's temperament
and the nature and demands of the environment in
which they are being raised.
= affect on LT dev’t

11. Infant Personality Development
Personality - enduring personal
characteristics
Includes emotions and temperament
Erikson: Early Py is shaped largely
by an infant’s personal
experiences [next]

13. Stages/Crises
 First year of life; Trust
 Age 2: Independence
“autonomy versus shame and doubt”
when caregivers are impatient and do for
toddlers what they are capable of doing
themselves, shame and doubt develop

14. The Development of Self
 SELF-AWARENESS,
knowledge of self, begins
to grow ~12 months.
 mirror and rouge task.
 Most infants attempt to wipe
off the rouge b/t 17-24
months.
 Ability to assess own
physical features emerges
in 2nd year.
 Crying, when presented
with complicated tasks,
implies consciousness.
[next]

15. Attachment
Konrad Lorenz
Imprinting Harry Harlow and one of his monkeys
[next]

16. Attachment

17. Attachment
 John Bowlby> attachment has a
biological basis
 Ainsworth Strange Situation: illustrates
the strength of attachment between a
child and (typically) his or her mother
[next]

18. Individual Differences in
Attachment
 Responses the Strange Situation
securely attached
insecure avoidant
insecure resistant
insecure disorganized

19. Individual Differences in
Attachment

20. Attachment:
The Roles of Mother & Father
 When stressed, infants tend to prefer their
mothers. [?]
 BUT, no preference when no stress (boredom,
fatigue, novel stimuli) present
 Fathers > more rough-and-tumble play;
mothers > more feeding and nurturing.
 An interconnecting constellation of
subsystems
 Generations, genders, roles,
 Reciprocal relationships

21. Attachment
 MUTUAL REGULATION MODEL
 RECIPROCAL SOCIALIZATION
 Scaffolding (turn-taking) part of the process

22. Gender
 Dissimilar worlds for members of each sex, even during
infancy.
 Fathers interact more with sons than daughters; mothers
more with daughters.
 Fathers > more rough-and-tumble play; mothers > more
feeding and nurturing.
 Infants wear different clothes and are given different toys
based on gender.
 Infants' behavior is interpreted differently depending on
gender.
 Male infants are more active and fussier than females.
 By age one, infants are able to distinguish between
males and females.

23. Day care and social and
personality development.
 2/3 between 4 months and 3 years of age
spend time in non-parental child care.
 > 80% of infants are cared for by people other
than mothers at some point during their first
year of life.

24. Day Care: Assessing Outcomes
Possible advantages Possible disadvantages
 Solve problems  Lower attachment.
better.
 Slower cognitive
 Pay greater attention development
to others.
 Use language more  Illness
effectively.
 Play well with others.

25. Where Are Children Cared
For?