Parent–infant affect synchrony during social and solo play

Abstract

While mother–infant affect synchrony has been proposed to facilitate the early development of social understanding, most investigations into affect synchrony have concentrated more on negative than positive affect. We analysed affect sharing during parent–infant object play, comparing positive and negative affect, to examine how it is modulated by shared playful activity. Mother–infant dyads ( N = 20, average infant age 10.7 months) played together (social) or separately (solo) using an object. Both participants increased positive affect during social play as compared with solo play. Positive affect synchrony also increased during social play compared with solo play, whereas negative affect synchrony did not differ. Closer examination of the temporal dynamics of affect changes showed that infants' shifts to positive affect tended to occur contingently in response to their mothers', whereas mothers’ shifts to negative affect followed their infants'. Further, during social play, positive affect displays were more long-lived while negative more short-lived. While our sample was small and from a homogeneous population (e.g. white, highly educated parents), limiting the implications of the findings, these results demonstrate that maternal active engagement in playful interaction with her infant affords, increases, and extends infant positive affect and parent–infant positive affect synchrony, providing insights into how the social context modulates infants’ affective experiences. This article is part of a discussion meeting issue ‘Face2face: advancing the science of social interaction’.

Face2face: advancing the science of social interaction

“…This kind of detailed observation and cataloguing of social behaviour provides an important building block for future theories of the development of gaze and visual communication. In a second developmental study, Kidby et al [29] examine the coordination of gaze and affect between 10-month-old infants and their mothers during solo play and social play. They find that the social play condition leads to more positive affect and more coordination.…”

Annual Research Review: ‘There, the dance is – at the still point of the turning world’ – dynamic systems perspectives on coregulation and dysregulation during early development

“…The term coregulation describes regulatory processes that operate through the dynamic, bidirectional coordination between two interacting partners. This is not the sole aim of caregiver–child interactions: smiles and play, for example, appear not to have a regulatory function (Kidby, Neale, Wass, & Leong, 2023; Murray et al., 2016). But it is central to early development (Feldman, 2006).…”

“…In Part 3 we discussed how children express negative affect to elicit coregulation, to help manage hyperarousal. The sharing of positive affect within child–caregiver interactions is also known to be atypical (in caregivers with depression, for example), but it remains poorly understood how positive valence systems, such as reward responsiveness, anticipation and valuation, are affected by, and develop through, caregiver–child coregulation (Kidby et al., 2023; Lunkenheimer et al., 2020).…”

Annual Research Review: ‘There, the dance is – at the still point of the turning world’ – dynamic systems perspectives on coregulation and dysregulation during early development

“…The term coregulation describes regulatory processes that operate through the dynamic, bidirectional coordination between two interacting partners. This is not the sole aim of caregiver-child interactions: smiles and play, for example, appear not to have a regulatory function (Kidby, Neale, Wass, & Leong, 2023;Murray et al, 2016). But it is central to early development (Feldman, 2006).…”

“…In Part 3 we discussed how children express negative affect to elicit coregulation, to help manage hyperarousal. The sharing of positive affect within child-caregiver interactions is also known to be atypical (in caregivers with depression, for example), but it remains poorly understood how positive valence systems, such as reward responsiveness, anticipation and valuation, are affected by, and develop through, caregiver-child coregulation (Kidby et al, 2023;Lunkenheimer et al, 2020).…”