Social Initiation And Responsiveness In Parent-Infant Interaction

Thirty‐eight infants were observed interacting separately with their mothers and fathers in the home at seven and 12 months of age. Social initiative measures together with reciprocal parental response measures adopted from Clarke‐Stewart were used. The infants distributed their social initiatives equally to both parents but made fewer initiatives when older. Ma ternal and paternal contingent responsiveness was highly correlated at both age levels. However, infants played more with their fathers than with their mothers. It is argued that the stylistic differences in how mothers and fathers responded to their infants represent differences in typical performance but not in optimal performance. Both parents become attachment figures because of their contingent responsiveness but with complementary, not redundant, roles.