A topical approach to life span development 6e chapter 6

Emotional Expression and Social Relationships• Infant communication of emotions • Permits coordinated interactions with caregivers • Beginning of emotional bond • Mutually Regulated reci

Chapter 6

Socioemotional Development

• Emotions- feeling, or affect, that occurs when a person is in a state or an interaction that is

important

• Positive or negative

• Biological but also embedded in relationships and culture

• Providing diversity in emotional experiences

• Primary - early on Like joy, anger, sadness, fear

• Self-conscious - Self-Awareness, with a sense of 'me" jealousy, empathy and

embarrassment

Emotional Expression and Social Relationships

• Infant communication of emotions

• Permits coordinated interactions with caregivers

• Beginning of emotional bond

• Mutually Regulated (reciprocal or synchronous)

• Parents change emotional expressions in response to infants

• Infants modify their emotional expression in response to parents

Emotional Expression and Social Relationships

• Crying (most important communication)

• Basic Cry - Rhythmic pattern

• Anger Cry - Variation of the basic cry

• Pain Cry- Sudden long

• Smiling (key social signal)

• Reflexive - not in response to stimuli

• Social smile- in response to an external stimulus

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Fear - (typically appears around 6 months)

• But can appear as early as 3 months in abused or neglected infants

• Research - infant fear is linked to guild, empathy, and low aggression at

6-7 years of age

Emotional Expression and Social Relationships

• Stranger Anxiety (frequent expression of fear)

• Fear and wariness of strangers

• Usually about 6-12 months

• Less when in familiar setting

• Less fearful of child strangers

• Less fearful of friendly, outgoing, smiling strangers

Emotional Expression and Social Relationships

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Emotional Regulation- infant gradually develops an ability to inhibit, or minimize,

the intensity and duration of emotional reactions

• Thumb sucking

• Caregivers soothing, such as rocking, lullabies, stroking

• Influencing infants' regulation of emotions

• Sooner the better

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Research - Spoiling cannot happen in first year.

• Parents should soothe a crying infant

• Helping infant develop a sense of trust and secure attachment to the

caregiver

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Temperament-individual differences in behavioral styles, emotions, and

characteristic ways of responding

• How quickly the emotion is shown,

• How strong it is

• How long it lasts, how quickly it fades away

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Temperament (Chess and Thomas' Classification) - moderately stable

across childhood years

• Easy child -generally positive, adapts easily

• Difficult child - generally negative, cries frequently, slow to accept

change

• Slow-to-warm-up child- low activity level, somewhat negative, low

intensity of mood

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Biological Foundations, Kagan

• Children inherit a particular type of temperament

• Through experience they may learn to modify their temperament to

some degree

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Gender and Temperament

• Shapes environmental context that influences temperament

• Parental reactions may be different for boys vs girls

• Culture and Temperament

• May vary with parents from different groups

• Childs environment can encourage or discourage the persistence of temperament characteristics

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Goodness of Fit and Parenting- Refers to the match between a child's

temperament and the environmental demands with which the child must cope

• Active child in quiet environment

• Slow to warm child in a new environment

• Can cause parenting challenges

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Parenting and the Child's Temperament"

• Attention to and respect for individuality

• Structuring the Child's environment

• Understanding 'difficult child'

• Be sensitive to the individual characteristics of the child

• Be flexible in responding to these characteristics

• Avoid apply negative label to the child (avoiding self-fulfilling prophecy)

Emotional Expression and Social Relationships

• Personality Development

• Personality the enduring personal characteristics of individuals

• Emotions and temperament form key aspects of personality

• Trust (Eriksons Trust vs Mistrust)

• Developing Sense of Self (Self recognition and self-awareness)

• Independence (autonomy vs shame)

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Social Orientation

• Face-to-face play - linked to secure attachment

• Interaction with peers (18-24 months) - increase their imitative and

reciprocal play

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Locomotion

• Influences exploration and expanding social world

• Allows more independent social interchanges

• The rewards from these pursuits lead to further efforts to explore and

develop skills

Emotional Expression and Social

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Attachment

• A close emotional bond between two people

• Securely attached babies-caregiver is a secure base to explore the environment

• Insecure avoidant babies-show insecurity by avoiding the caregiver (clinging anxiously or resisting,

• Insecure disorganized babies-show insecurity by begin disorganized and disoriented (dazed, confused, extreme fearful)- stronger avoidance and resistance

Emotional Expression and Social Relationships

• The Family

• Constellation of subsystems (Generational, Gender, Role)

• Father and child

• Mother and father

• Mother, father, child

• Etc.

• All with reciprocal influences

Emotional Expression and Social Relationships

• The Family

• Transition to Parenthood

• Disequilibrium and adaptation

• New family effects on attachments

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Reciprocal Socialization- mutual influence that parents and children exert

on each other

• Socialization that is bidirectional

• Children socialize parents

• Parents socialize children

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Scaffolding- A type of Reciprocal Socialization

• Practice in which parents time interactions so that infants experience

turn taking with parents

• Parental behavior support the child with positive reciprocal feedback

• Skill building

• Peek-a-boo, pat-a cake, etc

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Managing and Guiding Behavior

• To reduce or eliminate undesirable behaviors

• Includes, child-proofing the environment

• And corrective methods such as throwing objects, fussing, crying

• Diverting Attention, reasoning, ignoring, negotiating

• Harsh physical punishment can be harmful and progressive

Emotional Expression and Social

Relationships

• Child Care (economic issues0

• Quality child care can be achieved and seems to have few adverse effects on children.

• Safe environments,

• with age appropriate toys and activities

• Low caregiver-to child ratio

• Research - Higher-quality child care Was linked with fewer problems in children