Contingency, imitation, and affect sharing

Author(s)
Gabriela Markova, Maria Legerstee
Abstract

Predictions about the role of contingency, imitation, and affect sharing in the development of social awareness were tested in infants during natural, imitative, and yoked conditions with their mothers at 5 and 13 weeks of age. Results showed that at both ages, infants of highly attuned mothers gazed, smiled, and vocalized positively more during the natural than during the imitative and yoked conditions, whereas they increased negative vocalizations during the yoked conditions. In contrast, infants of less attuned mothers did not differentiate between the conditions, except at 13 weeks when these infants increased their gazes during the imitative condition. Whereas contingency and imitation draw infant attention to conspecifics, affective communication appears to lay the foundation for infants' social awareness.

Organisation(s)
External organisation(s)
York University
Journal
Developmental Psychology
Volume
42
Pages
132-141
No. of pages
10
ISSN
0012-1649
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1037/0012-1649.42.1.132
Publication date
01-2006
Peer reviewed
Yes
Austrian Fields of Science 2012
501005 Developmental psychology
Keywords
Portal url
https://ucris.univie.ac.at/portal/en/publications/contingency-imitation-and-affect-sharing(0703d19f-c61f-4920-9732-4b9a04b4aa47).html