Tuesday 15th September
Reciprocity and interactional synchrony

Innate – inborn / natural

Infancy – the period of life before speech begins (Latin word infans means ‘without speech’)
Non-verbal communication between caregivers and infants forms the basis of attachment between them
The way that each responds to the other is what determines the formation of attachment – the more sensitive each is to the others signals, the deeper the relationship.

Meltzoff and Moore 1977:
First study done on interactional synchrony
4 different stimuli – 3 faces and a hand gesture
Dummy was placed in baby’s mouth for initial display to prevent any response. Then the dummy was removed and the child’s expressions was recorded.
Observer watched the videotapes of the infant’s response in real time, slow motion and frame by frame.
Found there was an association between the infant’s behaviour and the adults.

1983 - They found the same association for babies who were only 3 days old.
Believed it showed that babies are learning from the minute they are born.

However….
Piaget (1962) believed it’s the baby naturally responding to things in the environment around them – response ‘training’ (the infant was repeating an action that was rewarded).
Believed true imitation only developed towards the end of the first year.
Pseudo imitation – the infant had not consciously translated what they see into a matching movement

Evidence against innate= Murray and Trevarthen (1985).
Baby was shown tape of mother who was not responding to its facial or bodily gestures, making the baby very distressed.
Infants tried to attract their mother’s attention which showed that the infant is actively eliciting response rather than displaying a response that has been rewarded.

Personal opinion:
Natural to copy people but they have to learn how to copy those specific actions, which