Infant studies conducted in Western countries documented that a major developmental transition occurs by the end of the 2nd month, indexed by the onset of social smiling, increased alertness, sustained visual attention, and speech-like sounds such as cooing. These transformations, and their effect on caregivers’ behavior, provide the infant with experiences of reciprocity via face-to-face exchanges, deemed fundamental for the development of social cognition. Only few studies have explored this transition in rural non-Western environments. These studies revealed both cross-cultural evidence for the 2-month transition and differences in maternal responses to their infants’ social signals, raising central questions regarding the nature of the 2-mont shift in cultures where face-to-face interaction with infants is rare. This symposium addresses these questions with four studies in traditional rural (Ghana, Kenya, Fiji, Cameroon) and urban Western (Canada, U.S., Germany, Italy) cultures, that rely on different perspectives and research paradigms, including longitudinal observational and experimental designs. The first two papers show cross-cultural evidence for the still-face-effect around the 2-month-shift when infants had high skin-to-skin-contact (paper 1), and mothers’ affect mirroring (paper 2). The third and fourth papers show that the infants’ behaviors indexing the 2-month transition are integrated in culture-specific patterns of mother-infant interaction, with different tools of analysis (contingency rates, paper 3; sequential analysis, paper 4). Taken together, these papers provide new evidence that the development of the 2-month shift in mother-infant interaction is affected by both the previous experience of mother-infant interaction and culture-specific patterns of interaction over and above neurological maturation.
Universality and cultural specificity in early mother-infant interaction: Is the 2-month transition really universal?
LAVELLI, Manuela
2014-01-01
Abstract
Infant studies conducted in Western countries documented that a major developmental transition occurs by the end of the 2nd month, indexed by the onset of social smiling, increased alertness, sustained visual attention, and speech-like sounds such as cooing. These transformations, and their effect on caregivers’ behavior, provide the infant with experiences of reciprocity via face-to-face exchanges, deemed fundamental for the development of social cognition. Only few studies have explored this transition in rural non-Western environments. These studies revealed both cross-cultural evidence for the 2-month transition and differences in maternal responses to their infants’ social signals, raising central questions regarding the nature of the 2-mont shift in cultures where face-to-face interaction with infants is rare. This symposium addresses these questions with four studies in traditional rural (Ghana, Kenya, Fiji, Cameroon) and urban Western (Canada, U.S., Germany, Italy) cultures, that rely on different perspectives and research paradigms, including longitudinal observational and experimental designs. The first two papers show cross-cultural evidence for the still-face-effect around the 2-month-shift when infants had high skin-to-skin-contact (paper 1), and mothers’ affect mirroring (paper 2). The third and fourth papers show that the infants’ behaviors indexing the 2-month transition are integrated in culture-specific patterns of mother-infant interaction, with different tools of analysis (contingency rates, paper 3; sequential analysis, paper 4). Taken together, these papers provide new evidence that the development of the 2-month shift in mother-infant interaction is affected by both the previous experience of mother-infant interaction and culture-specific patterns of interaction over and above neurological maturation.
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