Social Interaction

Traditionally, research on social communication has not focused on motor tasks and motor development has been studied as if infants are reared in a social vacuum. However, infants' assessments of potentially risky motor tasks are not based solely on their own perceptual exploration. Rather, perceptual information must be integrated with information obtained from social interactions with vigilant caregivers. In our social communication studies we investigate the development of social understanding by observing infant-mother communication in the context of potentially risky locomotor tasks, such as descending slopes. Older infants defer to mothers’ unsolicited advice only when the probability of falling is uncertain–50%; otherwise, they over-ride social information in favor of what they can see and feel for themselves. Younger infants are socially responsive, but use mothers’ advice more indiscriminately.

Using both naturalistic and experimental methods, we examine the informational bases for parents’ assessments of their infants’ present and future motor abilities. Parents’ expectations are often based on unreliable factors such as their child’s gender or their age at previous motor milestones, rather than developmental norms, the most predictive indicator. Although parents cannot accurately predict their infants’ behaviors in a novel task, parents adjust their expectations and behaviors from moment-to-moment as they observe their infants’ performance.