Most infants with more than 6 weeks of crawling experience completely avoid the deep side of a visual cliff (Campos, Bertenthal, & Kermoian, 1992; Gibson & Walk, 1960). However, some experienced crawlers do move onto the transparent surface suspended several feet above the ground. An important question is whether these "nonavoiders" lack wariness…

The goal of this investigation was to study the regulatory retention effects of an adult's emotional displays on infant behavior. In Study 1, 11- and 14-month-old infants were tested in a social-referencing-like paradigm in which a 1-hr delay was imposed between the exposure trials and the test trial. In Study 2, 11-month-olds were tested in the…

Cardiac and behavioral reactions to strangers were measured in 5-, and 9-month-olds. Results indicate that: (1) behavioral differences between 5- and 9-month-olds are reflected in heart rate differences, (2) there are differences in heart rate but not behaviors when mothers are absent, and (3) heart rate response is linked to affective expression.…

Work with infants on the "visual cliff" links avoidance of drop-offs to experience with self-produced locomotion. Adolph's (2002) research on infants' perception of slope and gap traversability suggests that learning to avoid falling down is highly specific to the postural context in which it occurs. Infants, for example, who have…

Do infants show distinct negative facial expressions for different negative emotions? To address this question, European American, Chinese, and Japanese 11-month-olds were videotaped during procedures designed to elicit mild anger or frustration and fear. Facial behavior was coded using Baby FACS, an anatomically based scoring system. Infants'…

Discusses the significance of emotional communication and social referencing of the mother by her infant as determinants of the infant's affective reactions to other social figures in the environment. (PCB)

The ability of forty 8-week-old infants to discriminate between projected-stereograms with and without retinal disparity was tested with an habituation-dishabituation paradigm. Results were interpreted as indicating that the infants could discriminate between stimuli when the only difference between them was binocular disparity. (MS)

Explored genetic and environmental underpinnings of temperamental differences in 3- to 16-month-old twins and their parents. Found that additive genetic and shared environmental effects best represented smiling, laughter, and duration of orienting. Shared environmental effects fully accounted for co-twin similarity for soothability. Additive…

Attempts to determine whether infants' performance in two search tasks is related to their entry into Stage 6 of object permanence development (thereby testing Piaget's claim that only Stage 6 infants possess the capacity for representation). (BD)

Examined the possibility that relations in the family system are affected when infants begin to crawl. Parents' expressions of prohibition and anger, and their use of physical punishment, increased after infants began to crawl. (BG)

Temperament of nine-month olds was assessed by means of questionnaires and two laboratory visits. Mothers' and fathers' agreement on questionnaire scales was low, and their factor structures differed. In laboratory measures, fearfulness and pleasure showed cross-situation generality, short-term stability, and convergence with questionnaire scales.…