Tamis-LeMonda-05-14-2021-7

The Developmentalist’s Toolbox 289

The Developmentalist’s Toolbox Method

Purpose

Description

Measuring infant emotional development

To assess infants’ abilities to detect emotional content communicated in auditory and visual modalities

Infants are presented with visual and auditory stimuli that contain emotional information, such as happy and sad faces or voices. Examiners ask whether infants look longer to visual displays that match the auditory soundtrack (angry voice with angry face). Examiners (or sometimes the infants’ caregivers) display emotional reactions such as joy or fear to objects in front of the infant. Infants’ approach or avoidance of the target objects indicates whether emotional information communicated by others guides infants’ behaviors. Examiners hold down infants’ arms to assess the intensity of their emotional reactions to a frustrating and anger-provoking situation. Infants are placed in a situation that requires them to inhibit a dominant response, such as wanting to grab a toy or snack, in favor of a less favorable but required response (waiting). The amount of time infants are able to resist touching the forbidden object indexes inhibitory control. Mothers interact naturally with their infants for a few minutes, followed by a segment during which they keep their face still and unresponsive. Infants’ level of distress at their mothers’ still face is thought to measure their emotion regulation or attachment to the caregiver. Infants and mothers visit a laboratory playroom, where they are introduced to the unfamiliar room. Each infant experiences a series of separations from their mother and exposure to a stranger. Examiners enact situations in which they display distress, the need for help, and so forth. The toddlers’ reactions are measured (such as helping behaviors). Infants observe prosocial “helper” entities or antisocial “hurting” entities that are displayed on monitors or enacted by examiners. The infants’ looking at and sometimes behaviors toward the two entities are as- sessed in different situations.

Emotion matching studies

To assess whether infants seek and use information about the emotional meaning of a situation by looking at and behaving in line with another person’s emotional cues To assess differences among infants in their emotional reactions of anger

Social referencing studies

Arm restraint studies

To assess aspects of infants’ abilities to regulate their emotions and behaviors

Inhibition tasks

To assess emotion regulation in infants in the context of non- responsive social interactions; also used to examine infant attachment to caregiver

Still-face experiment

Measuring infant attachment and prosocial behaviors PROPERTY OF OXFORD Strange Situation To assess attachment to a caregiver Structured observations to elicit prosocial behaviors To assess toddlers’ prosocial behaviors

To examine foundations to moral understanding, evaluation, and retribution

Helper-hinderer experiments

Measuring infant awareness of self

Single-touch and double-touch experiment UNIVERSITY PRESS To assess infants’ awareness of self Examiners compare infants’ reactions to touches that originate from the infants themselves (such as infants touching their own cheek) to touches that arise from others (examiners touching the infants’ cheek).