Elsevier

Infant Behavior and Development

Volume 15, Issue 1, January–March 1992, Pages 95-107
Infant Behavior and Development

Maternal contributions to infant regulation of arousal

https://doi.org/10.1016/0163-6383(92)90009-UGet rights and content

Abstract

The purpose of the current study was to longitudinally examine the relations between general characteristics of maternal behavior and the degree to which infants demonstrate an ability to regulate arousal. Thirty-two infant-mother dyads were visited at home and videotaped in two 3-min episodes of face-to-face interaction at 1 and 4 months infant age. Infant gaze behavior, head orientation, and facial expressions provided a composite index of infant arousal regulation. Results revealed positive within- and across-time associations between maternal interactive behaviors and infants' arousal-regulating abilities. Two features of 1-month maternal beahavior—state and physical activity—were highlighted in the prediction of 4-month infant arousal regulation. More specifically, hierarchical regression analyses revealed that these 1-month maternal behaviors accounted for a significant percent of the variance in 4-month infant arousal regulation, whereas earlier infant arousal regulation and concurrent maternal behaviors made insignificant contributions.

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    Portions of this research were presented at the International Conference on Infant Studies, April 1990, Montreal, Canada. This study and work on this manuscript were supported by a Faculty Research Grant from Utah State University and a Research and Development Award from the College of Social Sciences, University of Utah, to the second author. The authors are indebted to Ellen Cantrell and Owen Anderson for coding the face-to-face data.

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