Paper accepted for publication at the European Journal of Developmental Psychology
Emotional expressions during early infant-father conversation
Theano Kokkinaki
Department of Psychology
University of Crete, Greece
Work address: University of Crete
Department of Psychology
74 100 Rethymnon – Gallos
Crete – Greece
tel:++30 – 28310 - 77536
fax:++30 – 28310 – 77578
e-mail:nina@psy.soc.uoc.gr
Home address: 26, Leutheraiou Street,
71 305 Heraklion,
Crete – Greece
tel:++30 – 2810 – 261188
Keywords: emotional matching, emotional attunement, facial expressions of emotion,
infant-father interaction.
1
Notes and Acknowledgements
The data of the present study are derived from the Ph.D study of the researcher
(Department of Psychology, University of Edinburgh, under the supervision of
Professor Colwyn Trevarthen), for which ethical approval has been granted by the
Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, NHS Trust (8/95). I gratefully acknowledge Professor
Giannis Kugiumutzakis (University of Crete) and Dr Tricia Striano (Max Planck
Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences) for their assistance and invaluable
advice, and Assistant Professor Vassilis Vasdekis (Athens University of Economics
and Business) for his comments on the statistical analysis of this article. Above all, I
am deeply indebted to the infants and their families for “sharing” their time,
cooperation and patience to participate in this study.
2
Abstract
The present longitudinal and naturalistic study aims to investigate fathers’ and infants’ facial
expressions of emotions during paternal infant-directed speech. The microanalysis of infant and
paternal facial expressions of emotion in the course of the naturalistic interactions of 11 infant-father
dyads, from the 2nd to the 6th month, provided evidence that: a) fathers and infants match their
emotional states and attune their emotional intensity, b) infants seem to match paternal facial emotional
expressions more than vice versa, c) the prevailing emotional states of each partner remain constant in
the beginning and at the end of speech, d) the developmental trajectories of infant interest and paternal
pleasure change significantly across the age range of 2-6 months and they seem to follow similar
courses. These results are interpreted in the frame of the theory of innate intersubjectivity.
Introduction
The aim of the present longitudinal and naturalistic study was to analyze facial
expressions of emotions of fathers and infants in the course of spontaneous paternal
infant-directed speech taking place in dyadic infant-father interactions during early
infancy.
The temporal organization of dyadic emotional states in face-to-face parent - infant
interaction has been described through the application of various terms which imply
differences in conceptualizing how infants express their understanding by engaging in
reciprocal responses to the adult’s social signals (see also Muir, Lee, Hains & Hains,
2005). In “co-regulated” mutual matching both partners are trying to match each
other, and since this happens in a continuous way, each partner ends up trying to
match an action that is partly the self's and partly the other's reflected back to the first
(Fogel, 1993). The mutual and continuous nature of anticipatory action is reflected in
3
the concept of “mutual coordination” (Beebe and Jaffe, 1992, cited by Fogel, 1993).
“Mutual regulation” has been defined as the goal to achieve a joint regulation of the
interaction with interactive behaviors, or the goal of achieving a joint state of
reciprocity. The quality of each partner's display relative to the quality of the other's
display is a measure of match existing between their intentionality and affectivity.
When synchronization is not achieved, there is a mismatching and lack of cyclic
build-up of the behaviors into a smooth flow of phases (Brazelton, Tronick, Adamson,
Als & Wise, 1975; Weinberg, Tronick, Cohn and Oslon, 1999). Lately, Tronick
(2005) proposed that “dyadic states of consciousness” – the successful regulation of
meaning leading to the emergence of a mutually induced dyadic state of meaning and states of consciousness have an intensity and force. The emotion brought into a
state of consciousness may be one variable affecting intensity. Dyadic states of
consciousness with greater force and intensity are ones that assemble more private
meaning from each individual into shared meanings. “Affect attunement” is a form of
matching that excludes imitation, in which the referent for the match is not the
external action, but the presumed feeling state of the partner (Stern, Hofer, Haft &
Dore, 1985). “Intersubjectivity” is the process in which mental activity – including
conscious awareness, motives, intentions and emotions – is transferred between minds
(Trevarthen, 1993a, 1993b, 2005).
Limited evidence on the temporal organization of emotional states in infant-father
interactions come from comparisons with mother-infant interaction - within different
theoretical frames - and provides evidence of differences and similarities in the
intensity of dyadic mutual regulation (Kokkinaki, 2003; Yogman, 1982).
In the present study we hypothesized that emotional coordination (emotional
matching of dyadic facial expressions or emotional attunement of dyadic emotional
4
intensity) between infants' and fathers' emotional expressions would be evident in the
course of natural paternal infant-directed speech. This hypothesis is based on the welldocumented communicative function of infant-directed speech (Papousek, Papousek
& Bornstein, 1985; Trevarthen, 2005).
Studying facial expressions of emotions during spontaneous paternal infant-directed
speech is important due to the suggestion that infant's preference for infant-directed
speech cannot be explained solely by the information contained in pitch contours,
since male and female speakers use different features to convey the same affective
messages to their infants (McCartney, 1997; Slaney & McRoberts, 2003).
Method
Recruitment and Participants
After ethical approval had been obtained (see notes), participants were recruited
through the assistance of local obstetricians and pediatricians. Parents were informed
with respect to the procedure of the study and were asked to sign the consent form
prior to video-recording. Visits at infants’ home and video-recordings were scheduled
at a time when the infants were reported by their mothers to be alert and playful and
when the father was at home.
Eleven infant-father pairs (N=22) participated in this study. The fathers’ mean
age was 33.63 years (SD = 5.69, range : 27-47 years). All the 11 infants (5 males and
6 females) were full-term and healthy. The infants’ mean birth weight was 3568 gr
(SD = 487.479, range : 2800-4250 gr), and the mean birth height was 52.22 cm (SD =
2.160, range : 48-55cm).
Procedure
Video-recordings were made at 15-day intervals, starting when the infant was 2
months old until he/she was 6 months old. Each recording lasted 8-10 minutes (8
5
minutes for the younger infants aged 2-4 months and 10 minutes for the older infants
aged 4.5 to 6 months). Over the course of the study, nine video-recordings were made
for each infant. A total of 99 video-recordings were made for the entire sample while
the total duration of video-recorded and analyzed interactions was 880 minutes.
The only instruction given to the fathers was: “Play as you normally do with
your baby”. The recordings took place in a room and a position chosen by the fathers
prohibiting any third-party intervention. If the infant became distressed or either the
father or the researcher considered that the visit should be postponed for some reason,
it was rescheduled as soon as possible thereafter. All recordings were made with a
Panasonic NV-MS4 S-VHS HI-FI STEREO camera.
Coding
In order to micro-analyze the facial expressions of emotions of each and both partners
in the course of spontaneous paternal infant-directed speech in a reliable way, the
flow of interaction had to be structured in a well-defined way. This was the reason
that paternal infant-directed speech was classified into verbal expression categories
and grouped into units and subunits of analysis, independently of the fact that this
categorization is not related to the research questions of this paper.
Paternal infant-directed speech was transcribed verbatim from the videorecording, verified against the original tapes, and categorized into the following
verbal expression categories: 1) infant-focus paternal utterances, described the infant's
internal and external state and responded to the infant's non-vocal cues, 2) fatherfocus paternal utterances described the father's own behavior(s), desire(s) and
presence, 3) dyad-focus paternal utterances described the father's attempt to: a)
communicate with the infant through vocal expression and/or verbal response, b)
describe the dyadic emotional / behavioral exchange and, c) express “sharing”
6
(through the use of “we”) of behaviors/physiological states/body parts/gaze direction
with the infant, 4) other-focus paternal utterances described an external situation, an
object/toy or refers to a third person, 5) nursery songs, repeated vocalization(s),
sentence(s) and non-speech sound(s), non-responsive to infant cues, were analyzed as
separate no-focus categories. This scheme adapted and extended certain parts of the
categorization system developed by Murray and her colleagues (Murray and
Trevarthen, 1986; Murray, Kempton, Woolgar and Hooper, 1993).
Each of the above categories of paternal utterance and the pauses following
them were micro-analysed (in accuracy of 1/25th of a second) in order to be grouped
into units and subunits of analysis. The unit of analysis was defined as a temporal
period which began at the start of one paternal verbal expression category and it
ended at its termination. Each unit of analysis contained one or more categories of
verbal expression, that is, subunits of analysis, depending on the pause duration
between these categories. In the case that the pause between two categories was
shorter or equal to 2 seconds then these categories constituted part of the same unit of
analysis and the transcription and analysis of paternal speech was continued within
this unit of analysis. If the pause between two categories was longer than 2 seconds
then a new unit of analysis began. The 2-second pause has been judged adequate for
the change of content of parental utterances (Herrera, Reissland and Shepherd, 2004).
Diagram 1 shows an example of categorization of paternal infant-directed
speech into units and subunits of analysis, the accompanying paternal and infant facial
expressions of emotions and emotional intensity for each sub-unit of analysis, the
elapsed time and the video duration in an eight digit number string (these eight digits
are four pairs of numbers representing the time in hours, minutes, seconds and frames
in twenty fifths of a second, which was then transformed into seconds).
7
(Insert Diagram 1 about here)
In the cases of infant physiological need (e.g. infant vomit), micro-analysis was
interrupted independently from the pause duration.
Paternal utterances that were either inaudible or un-intelligible in meaning,
were excluded from the analysis, but this occurred rarely. Paternal whispers were
analyzed given that they constitute 14.6% of paternal utterances in early infancy
(Papousek, Papousek & Bornstein, 1985), along with physiological sounds, since
fathers respond often to these expressions by imitation (Kokkinaki, 1998) and verbal
comments.
Within each subunit of analysis, the coding scheme described six types of
facial expressions [happy (pleasure directed to the partner/external world, interest
directed to the partner), neutral (neutral expression, interest directed to the external
world) and sad], three qualities of valence (positive, neutral and negative), and four
categories for the direction of intensity change (ascending, descending, stable and
fluctuating).
The pleasure facial expression directed to the partner was coded when the eyes are
open, focused and attentive to the partner or they convey bright and animated
pleasure, mouth is elongated, that is closed, slightly open or open in the horizontal
plane, the corners of the mouth are slightly pulled back and/or drawn upwards, the
lips are slightly or more distinctly stretched causing wrinkles on each side of the
mouth and the cheeks are slightly drawn upwards or raised.
Interest directed to the partner was defined according to eye contact, gaze or
orientation to the other partner’s face or body. When one partner is gazing at the other
partner’s face or body, interest was signalled by an unsmiling face, with open eyes.
The lips are usually open or at other times loosely closed. When the lips are open, the
8
corners of the mouth are slightly downward, with the upper lip in a reversed-U shape,
and the lower lip is relaxed or slightly stretched. In addition to gaze behaviour, one or
a combination of the following facial or vocal expressions may occur: a) raised
eyebrows, b) knitted eyebrows, c) blinking, d) cooing (for the infant) or other
vocalizations (infant, father), e) pre-speech mouth movements (infant).
Neutral expression was identified when one subject was not alert while he/she
was looking passively or orienting himself to own or partner’s body. The expression
should be one of an unsmiling face, with no signs of body movement, vocalization or
intent to vocalize (pre-speech mouth movements). In another situation, neutral was
coded when the infant showed signs of self-absorption (looking passively own
body/parts of the body) or sleepiness (yawning, rubbing eyes).
Interest/Pleasure directed to the inanimate world was identified when one
partner showed signs of interest and/or pleasure addressed not to the other partner, but
to external objects.
Negative facial expression was signified by a furrowed brow (lines on the
forehead), wrinkles around the eyes and the nose, tight and somewhat protruded lips,
mouth either open or closed, corners of the mouth slightly downward or pulled
downward while the infant is gazing at or away from the parent’s face or trunk. The
denotation of parent’s emotional expression as “negative” was extremely rare. This
was signified in cases in which the parent showed signs of annoyance that was rather
expressed by verbalization than by facial expression.
Coding of the infant and paternal facial expressions of emotions was
continuous, since the onset time in the expression of an emotion of one partner was
also the offset time of the previous emotion of the same partner. In the course of one
subunit of analysis in the flow of paternal speech, it was most likely for each partner
9
to express more than one emotional state. In order to obtain a description of the
change of intensity over time, each facial expression within each category of
emotional valence represented a symbol in the following scale: (a) positive emotional
valence consisted of pleasure directed to the partner (+++), pleasure directed to the
inanimate world (++), and interest directed to the partner (+), (b) neutral emotional
valence consisted of the neutral facial expression and the interest directed to the
external world (0), and (c) negative emotional valence consisted of the negative facial
expression (-).
After the microanalysis of paternal and infant facial expressions of emotions
within each subunit of analysis, emotional matching and mismatching, or the
sequential combination of them, were determined for each subunit, according to the
type and the sequence of facial expression of both partners within this subunit.
In the present study, emotional matching was coded when one partner (2)
expressed the valence (positive, neutral, negative) of facial expression of emotion of
the other partner (1) before the first completes it, independently of the intensity of it
(e.g. emotional matching of pleasure was coded when father expressed laughter while
the infant expressed grin). The temporal organization of the emotional matching,
within each subunit of analysis, showed the direction of it, that is, which partner
expressed first an emotion which was then expressed by the other partner. For
example, infant emotional matching was coded when the father expressed pleasure in
the course of one subunit, while the infant, in the course of the same subunit,
expressed self-absorption in the beginning, which was then changed to pleasure. It
has to be clarified that the termination of the facial expression of emotion of the
second partner could occur either before or after the termination of the facial
expression of the first partner (photographs 1a, 1b and 2a, 2b).
10
(Insert photographs 1a, 1b, 2a and 2b about here)
In addition, when one subunit of analysis of paternal speech began and ended,
or just began, with emotional matching, the direction of it was not coded since the
matching was either simultaneous, or it had started during the previous pause of
paternal speech.
Emotional mismatching was coded when one or either partner was not
interested in interacting with the other partner. In the first case, one partner expressed
interest or pleasure to the partner, while the other was neutral or negative in emotion.
When either partner was not interested in communication, one partner was neutral in
emotion while the other was negative.
The sequence of the above symbols of each partner in the course of each
subunit of paternal infant-directed speech determined the direction identified for the
change of emotional intensity as follows: a) Ascending is defined as a sequence in
which the intensity of the last emotional state of one partner at the end of the verbal
expression category is higher in the scale than the intensity of the first emotional state
of the same partner in the beginning of this category, e.g. when the infant changes
from interest (+) to pleasure (+++) directed to the partner, b) Descending is defined as
a sequence in which the intensity of the last emotional state of one partner at the end
of the category is lower in the scale than the intensity of the first emotional state of
the same partner in the beginning of this category, e.g. when interest (+) is followed
by a negative emotional state (-), c) Fluctuating sequence is defined as one in which
the intensity of the first and the last emotional states of one partner is the same in
position in the scale, while the intermediate intensity(s) are different, e.g. when
pleasure to the partner (+++) is followed by neutral emotional state (0) and this is
followed by pleasure again (+++) and, d) Stable category refers to an unchanging
11
intensity of emotional state of one partner in the whole course of a category, e.g. a
partner expresses interest throughout the paternal verbal expression.
Inter-observer reliability assessments were made for the facial expressions of
emotions and the intensity of paternal and infant emotional states. Inter-observer
reliability for all categories ranged from 0.76 to 0.86, the mean value of k for all
categories being 0.80. Scores obtained for the facial expressions of emotions ranged
from 0.76 to 0.85, and those for emotional intensity ranged from 0.76 to 0.86. After
the end of inter-observer reliability assessments, the two scorers discussed and
corrected each assessment on which there was disagreement. The statistical analysis
was carried out after all the corrections were made on the data set.
Statistical Analysis
This experiment, by its nature, generated data with relatively strong dependencies
between them since repeated observations on time are obtained on a relatively small
number of individuals. These longitudinal dependencies were not taken into account
in the analysis because of their complexity. Therefore, for the statistical analysis, the
chi-square test of independence was used to determine possible relationships between
pairs of categorical variables. This would tend to increase the number of significant
results. For this reason, the significance level was set at 1% (instead of 5%), as a
safeguard against false rejections of the null hypothesis, increasing therefore the
power of the test. No chi-square value was considered as valid if a minimum expected
frequency less than one was found. For convenience, when results are presented in a
table, the independent variable will always be presented in the columns. Conclusions
based on these tables, will be made as regards the distribution of the dependent
variable, for each value of the independent variable. When there was a disagreement
between frequencies and percentages, the conclusions will be reached in relation to
12
percentages since inferences on the basis of frequencies can be misleading when
different sample sizes are used for different levels of explanatory variables. All
analysis were performed using SPSS statistical package (Version 13, 2004).
Results
In the course of 880 minutes of free infant-father interaction a total of 4386 subunits
of analysis of paternal infant-directed speech were recorded. Given that the
investigation of the relationship between infant and paternal emotions was the main
interest of this analysis, any relationship would be of interest provided that it
concerned the common predominant emotions of both partners, that is, paternal
pleasure and interest (81.2% and 40%, respectively) and infant pleasure and interest
(27.4% and 59.5%, respectively).
A relationship between the fathers' and the infants' emotions (χ2 = 137.99, df =
4, p<0.001) (Table 1) showed that when the father was expressing pleasure, the infant
was also pleased (22.5%) more than when the father was showing interest (6.6%) or
pleasure and interest directed to the father, sequentially (4.5%). When the father was
showing interest, the infant was more likely to be interested (89.7%) than when the
father was pleased (52.1%) or pleased and interested (44.3%). When the father was
expressing pleasure and interest, the infant was more likely to express both emotions
(51.1%) than when the father was pleased (25.4%) or interested (3.7%).
(Insert Table 1 about here)
Descriptive analysis of the emotional matching, mismatching and their
combination, provided evidence that emotional matching occurred in 1140 (26%)
subunits, emotional mismatching was analysed for 1276 (29.1%) subunits and their
combination described the dyadic emotional states of 1970 (44.9%) subunits.
13
As long as the direction of emotional matching is concerned, the following
description and the analysis that regards the relationship between the direction of
emotional matching and infant’s age is based on the frequencies that represent infant
and paternal emotional matching derived from the subunits that contained one
matching and from the first emotional matching of the subunits that contained more
than one matching. The present data provided evidence that emotional matching by
the infant occurred in 1815 (76.7%) subunits of analysis and predominated over
emotional matching by the father which was coded
in 551 (23.3%) subunits
(p<0.0001, two-tailed Binomial test).
Independently of the direction of emotional matching, a relationship between
infant and paternal emotional intensity (χ2 = 471.06, df = 9, p < 0.001) (Table 2)
shows that when the emotions of the father were ascending, the infant’s emotions
were mostly ascending (36%) than when the father was descending (17.6%), stable
(18%) or fluctuating (22.6%). Similarly, when the father’s emotions were descending,
stable or fluctuating, the infant’s emotional intensity changed rather in the same than a
different direction.
(Insert Table 2 about here)
Even, when the direction of emotional matching was taken into consideration, a
relationship between infant and paternal emotional intensity, during the course of the
subunits in which the infant matched the emotions of the father (χ2 = 52.674, df=4,
p<0.0001), revealed that when the emotions of the father were ascending, the infant's
emotions were mostly ascending (56.4%) than when paternal emotions were
descending
(27.7%), or
fluctuating (29.2%). When the father's emotions were
descending, the infant's emotions were mostly descending (24.6%) than when paternal
emotions were ascending (10.7%), or fluctuating (20.2%). Similarly, when paternal
14
emotions were fluctuating, the infant’s emotions were mostly fluctuating (50.2%) than
when paternal emotions were ascending (32.9%), or descending (47.7%). Infant and
paternal categories of stable emotional intensity were eliminated due to the low
frequencies of infant stable category. Similarly, a relationship between infant and
paternal emotional intensity, during the course of the subunits in which the father
matched the emotions of the infant (χ2 = 52.304, df = 4, p<0.0001), revealed that when
the emotions of the infant were ascending, the father's emotions were mostly
ascending (66.7%) than when infant emotions were descending (29.5%) or fluctuating
(33.5%). Similarly, when the infant's emotions were descending or fluctuating, the
father's emotional intensity changed rather in the same (24.1% and 48.1%,
respectively) than a different direction.
A relationship between paternal predominant emotions in the beginning and at
the end of spontaneous paternal speech (χ2 = 1780.86, df = 1, p < 0.001) shows that
when the father was pleased in the beginning of free paternal speech, it was more
highly probable to remain pleased at the end of paternal infant-speech than when he
was interested in the beginning of paternal infant-directed speech. Further, when the
father was interested in the beginning of paternal infant-directed speech, he was
mostly likely to remain interested at the end of it than when he was pleased in the
beginning of paternal infant-directed speech. Similarly, a relationship between infant
predominant emotions in the beginning and at the end of spontaneous paternal speech
(χ2 = 1573.38, df = 4, p < 0.001) provides evidence that when the infant was pleased,
interested to the father or expressed interest/pleasure to the inanimate world in the
beginning of paternal speech, he/she was more likely to express the same respective
emotional expressions at the end of it.
15
The analysis for the relationship between infant’s age and partners’ emotions
was carried out only for the prevailing emotions of infant interest and paternal
pleasure. Chi-square analysis showed a significant relationship between infant interest
and age (χ2 = 71.520, df = 8, p < 0.001) and paternal pleasure and age (χ2 = 37.88, df =
8, p < 0.001). As seen in Figure 1, the developmental curves of infant interest and
paternal pleasure seem to be similar across the age range of 2 to 6 months.
(Insert Figure 1 about here)
Discussion
This study aimed to investigate the facial expressions of emotions of infants and
fathers in the course of free paternal infant-directed speech taking place in dyadic
naturalistic interactions from the second to the sixth month of life.
The present study provided evidence that in the course of spontaneous paternal
infant-directed speech, fathers and infants coordinated their emotional expressions,
either in the form of emotional matching (one partner expressed the valence of the
facial expression of emotion of the other partner), or in the form of emotional
attunement (one partner matched the shifts of emotional intensity of the other
partner). The evidence of emotional attunement between infant and paternal
expressions, is reinforced the quantification of Table 2, which shows the relationship
between paternal and infant emotional intensity. One reasonable way to quantify
attunement is to see the ratio of the cases in which attunement occurred to the total
number of the observed cases. The sum of the frequencies of the central diagonal to
the total number of cases (171 + 63 + 1864 + 136 = 2234 / 4386 = 0.50) provides such
an index.
The evidence of infant and paternal emotional matching and attunement of facial
expressions in the course of fathers' speech implies that the emotional context
16
accompanying
paternal
infant-directed
speech
constitutes
an
example
of
intersubjectivity, that is, the process in which mental activity – including motives and
emotions – is transferred between minds (Trevarthen, 1998b; Trevarthen, Kokkinaki
& Fiamengi, 1999). In particular, the evidence provided implies that both fathers and
infants adjust the timing, form and energy of their emotional facial expressions to
obtain inter-synchrony. Timing adjustment is evidenced by the temporal structure of
emotional matching implied by the definition of it. This may imply that infants not
only are they able to adjust or fit their emotions to the emotions of others, but they
participate actively and control to a great extent the exchange. In this way infants may
compensate or counter-balance for the predominance of parental over infant imitation
of other expressive behaviors. (Kokkinaki, 1998; Kugiumutzakis, 1993). This
suggestion may be integrated in the hypothesis that communication is regulated by an
integrated system of equivalent expressions, in which most responses are
complementary translations of the partners expressions (Trevarthen, 1993a).
Despite the fact that in this study, the coding of facial expressions of emotions
did not include fine-grained measurements of muscle activity, emotional matching of
facial expressions implies, indirectly, adjustment of spatial patterns or forms of
muscle activity. Given that the human facial communicative system has a highly
differentiated facial anatomy “...attached a bisymmetric set of muscle units that are
differentially excitable...” (Trevarthen, 1985, p. 22), and that “...the discrete facial
muscle actions visible in the adult can be identified and finely discriminated in
newborns” (Oster and Ekman, 1978, cited by Field, 1982, p.284), matching of facial
expressions of emotions implies adjustment or fitting of the spatial patterns of father's
and infants' facial muscle activities.
17
Energy adjustment is evidenced by emotional attunement of facial expressions
of emotions, as implied by the matching of emotional shifts. The present study
provided evidence that when the father's emotional intensity was rising, infants were
found to attune in a sympathetic ascending way, as if they agreed on rising the
emotional intensity of interaction. When the father's emotions were descending,
infant's emotional tone fell, as if infants consented on leading the interaction into
disruption. When fathers' expressions of emotions fluctuated, infants' emotional tone
was also fluctuating, either because of the infant's effort to search for stability, or
because infants were trying to subtly attune to all the shifts in the father's emotional
tone. Further, when the father's emotions were stable in quality, infants did not change
their emotional expressions, implying their intention to facilitate and maintain
interaction. These regulating patterns provide evidence that infants can experience
both self-awareness and other-awareness as well as awareness of purposeful sharing
of emotional states (Trevarthen, 1993a, 1993b).
This suggestion is reinforced by the “consistency” and “stability” in infants’
and fathers’ emotional states and emotional intensity in the course of spontaneous
paternal infant-directed speech. This kind of consistency suggests that paternal infantdirected speech constitutes an expressive system featured by self-regulatory emotions
aimed for coherence in awareness, consciousness and purpose, unified intentionality
and control of internal states and processes (Izard, 1992; Trevarthen, 1993b).
The evidence of similar courses of infant interest and paternal pleasure and the
non-linear developmental course of infant emotions provided by this study implies
periodic reorganizations in the infant's motivational system (Kugiumutzakis, 1993;
Trevarthen, 1998a), which may give rise to either corresponding motivational changes
in fathers, or to changes in his perception of the moods and interests of infants. The
18
similarity of developmental curves imply the dyadic propelling of development by the
interaction of motivational changes in both infants and fathers (Trad, 1990).
In sum, the present study provided evidence that the emotional context
accompanying paternal infant-directed speech during early infancy constitutes an
example of intersubjective coordination (evidenced by mutual adjustment of timing,
form and energy of emotional expressions) and intra-subjective regulation (evidenced
by the “consistency” in infants’ and fathers’ emotional states and emotional intensity).
This evidence highlights the need for more intensive research on the emotional
aspects of paternal-infant-directed speech given that the focus on facial expressions,
as index of emotions, has to be completed by the investigation of other expressive
systems that convey affective information (Weinberg and Tronick, 1994).
19
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Diagram 1: Microanalysis of paternal and infant facial expressions of emotions during units
and subunits of paternal infant - directed speech.
p > 2sec
Pat. speech
Unit 1
Unit 2
Subunit 1
Subunit 2
Subunit 3
Subunit 1
"Shall we do apsiou, apsiou, apsiou, tsiou?"
Non speech
sounds
"Why are you opening your mouth?
Why are you opening it?
Dad is not food."
"Shall we go for a walk?
Let' s go for a walk."
Pat. emotions
pleasure (+++)
interest (+)
neutral (0)
negative (-)
Inf. emotions
pleasure (+++)
interest (+)
neutral (0)
23
pat. emot. intensity
pleasure (+++)
Inf. emot. intensity
pleasure (+++)
video duration elapsed time
negative (-)
0 (sec)
descending
ascending
stable
interest (+)
stable
neutral (0)
negative (-)
interest (+)
stable
stable
descending
stable
neutral (0)
negative (-)
10:28
pause
1:56
3:16
pause
0:48
pause
5:04
8:36
9:76
0
00:05:26:08
00:05:29:16
00:05:16:01
(h:m:s:f)
00:05:27:22
00:05:30:03
00:05:38:12
00:05:43:13
00:05:53:07
Photograph 1a
Matching of interest expression
Baby boy two (2) months old: In the
course of mutual eye contact, the
father starts talking with an unsmiling
face with raised eyebrows while the
infant is motionless, expressing
interest to him.
Photograph 2a
Matching of pleasure expression
Baby boy six (6) months old: Infant
and father seem to enjoy paternal
singing with mutual expressions of
pleasure.
24
Photograph 1b
The father ends his question while
mutual eye contact, with attentive and
unsmiling faces, still feature infant
father interaction
Photograph 2b
The father stops singing, and in the
course of eye contact, both partners
still express mutual pleasure.
Table 1: Relationship between paternal and infant emotions during paternal infantdirected speech
_____________________________________________________________________
Paternal facial expressions of emotions
_____________________________________________________________________
Infant facial expressions
of emotions
Pleasure
Interest
Pleasure/Interest
Pleasure
184 (22.5%)
9 (6.6%)
8 (4.5%)
Interest
427 (52.1%)
122 (89.7%)
78 (44.3%)
Pleasure/Interest
208 (25.4%)
5 (3.7%)
90 (51.1%)
_____________________________________________________________________
Table 2: Relationship between paternal and infant emotional intensity during paternal
infant-directed speech
_____________________________________________________________________
Paternal emotional intensity
_______________________________________
Infant emotional intensity
Ascending
Descending
Stable Fluctuating
_____________________________________________________________________
Ascending
171 (36%)
40 (17.6%)
603 (18%)
76 (22.6%)
Descending
60 (12.6%)
63 (27.8%)
454 (13.6%)
68 (20.2%)
Stable
127 (26.7%)
55 (24.2%)
1864 (55.7%) 56 (16.7%)
Fluctuating
117 (24.6%)
69 (30.4%)
427 (12.8%) 136 (40.5%)
25
_____________________________________________________________________
Figure 1: Developmental curves of paternal pleasure and infant interest during
paternal infant-directed speech across the age range from 2 to 6 months.
26
500
400
Frequency
300
Emotional expression
Paternal pleasure
Infant interest
200
2,00
3,00
2,50
4,00
3,50
5,00
4,50
Infants's age (in months)
27
6,00
5,50
28