The continuation of the present project has three related aims: (a) Delineation of the developmental changes in infants' affect expressions and other coping behaviors in response to acute pain (immunogenic inoculations--physical stressors), (b) determination of the origins of the pain-fear bond, and (c) the use of affect expressions and other affect-related responses to the physical stressor and individual difference measures in early infancy to predict types of mother-infant attachment in response to a psychological stressor (the Ainsworth strange situation) at 12 to 15 months. The variables in the pain situation of principal interest are the (a) latency, (b) sequencing, and (c) duration of affect expressions and (d) other affect-related postural-gestural-locomotor behaviors. Measures of "temperament" and cognitive growth are taken in order to increase our understanding of the ontogeny of affective behaviors in response to pain and for evaluation of their usefulness as additional predictors of types of attachment. Facial behaviors are coded by Izard's facial movement and affect identification systems and the postural-gestural-locomotor behaviors with a system adapted from Bobbitt, McGrew et al. The system for coding behaviors and classifying infants in the strange situation is that of Ainsworth.
NIH ExPorter
NIH ExPorter