What are the father and mother differences in infant interaction?

What are the father and mother differences in infant interaction?

[mme_highlight] Parent-infant interaction plays a fundamental role in the socioemotional development of infants. Parent positive affect has proven to be a key element. It is well established that fathers express positive affect less often than mothers but, on the other hand, spend more time engaging in physical playing with their infants. [mme_highlight]

Parent-infant interaction plays a fundamental role in the socioemotional development of infants and recent scientific research has proven so. In fact, regardless of any differences in the father-infant or mother-infant interactions, it should be emphasized that parent positive affect has a unique role in promoting infant positive affect too, which has important implications for later social and emotional adjustment of children.

How does parental affect influence babies?

Parent positive affect has proven to be a key element to the emotional and social development of infants. For instance, the work of Cohn and Elmore has elicited that if mothers show a still-face or contingent in response to their infant’s smile, infants tend to look away. In addition, if mothers maintain a still face for a long period or simulate depression, babies’ smiles become attenuated and, again, they tend to look away. Parental depression is known to be a risk factor for affective psychopathology in children and the face to face interaction with parents can mediate, at least in part, this risk.

What are the father and mother differences in infant interaction?

It is well established that fathers express positive affect less often than mothers but, on the other hand, spend more time engaging in physical playing with their infants. Interpreting the functionalist perspective of Campos and colleagues, parents’ positive affect and physical play

may have a similar function as both may promote infant positive affect. Taking this point of view, then fathers’ physical play could compensate for their lower positive affect in comparison to mothers and thus infant positive affect would occur in similar frequency in response to the interaction with mothers and fathers.

A study conducted by Forbes EE and colleagues examined infants’ positive and negative affect by observing behavior during normal and still-face conditions occurring during mother-infant and father-infant interaction at ages 3 and 6 months, supporting the findings stated in the topic above, as shown in the box below.

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Correlations between Infants’ Positive and Negative Affect and Mothers’ and Fathers’ Positive Affect and Physical Play

  • Mothers displayed more positive affect with infants than did fathers

– F = 7.58 (coefficient obtained after analysis of variance), p < 0.01(statistically significant)

 

  • Fathers were more likely to exhibit physical play than were mothers

– χ2 = 9.03 (coefficient obtained after categorical modeling analyses), p < 0.01(statistically significant)

 

  • Parents were more likely to exhibit physical play with infants at 3 months than at 6 month

– χ2 = 5.21 (coefficient obtained after categorical modeling analyses), p < .05(statistically significant)
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Are there differences in mother and father behavior in skin-to-skin contact with their baby

Skin to skin contact between mother and infant must occur as immediate as possible after birth as this induces a biological program that promotes a breast seeking behavior and the whole relationship between baby and parents. This is also true regarding fathers, as it is established that fathers who have skin to skin contact with their newborn after birth reduce infants’ cry and fathers also feel satisfied knowing they can offer similar care as mothers. In addition, tactile contact by parents with their newborn is absolutely crucial as this makes the baby feel loved and cared; tactile contact may also help fathers to understand their newborns behavior.

A study by Velandia M et al. compared mothers’ and fathers’ interaction with their newborn immediately after birth by watching behaviors like touching, kissing and speaking. Importantly, both fathers and mothers showed spontaneous behavior of affection towards their newborn; they smiled and kissed the newborn, which has an obvious impact for bonding.

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Parental behavior in skin-to-skin contact with their baby – touching

  • Mothers in touched their infants significantly more than fathers
  • df = 1, F = 14.138 (after analysis of variance), p = 0.001(statistically significant)
  • Mothers touched newborn girls for a mean of 7.59 minutes (95% CI 2.955–12.225)
  • Mothers newborn boys for a mean of 14.5 minutes (95% CI 6.81–22.19)
  • Mothers touched girls significantly less than boys
  • df = 1, F = 5.152 (after analysis of variance), p = 0.038 (statistically significant)

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Interestingly, mothers’ physical approach to their newborn was firstly by finger tipping, whereas the father more commonly touched the infant with the palm of his hand.

Regarding speaking, mothers length of directed speech towards the newborn girls and boys did not differ. In opposite, fathers directed significantly less speech towards their newborn girls in comparison to boys as the box below shows.

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Parental behavior in skin-to-skin contact with their baby – Speaking

  • Mothers length of directed speech towards the newborn girls: 2.68 min (mean; 95% CI 0.24–5.125);
  • Mothers length of directed speech towards the newborn boys: 2.76 min (mean; 95% CI 1-6.5).
  • Fathers length of directed speech towards the newborn girls: 2.5 min (mean; 95% CI 1.055–3.835)
  • Fathers length of directed speech towards the newborn boys: 5.6 min (95% CI 1.67–9.53)

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Summary and Recommendations

  • The interaction between parents and infants plays a fundamental role in the socioemotional development.
  • The expressions of affection in parents’ faces as well as their simulation of depression have been proved to affect infants affect response too.
  • Fathers express positive affect less often than mothers but, on the other hand, spend more time engaging in physical playing with their infants. These between mother and father differences may compensate and the result, overall, may be similar.
  • Skin to skin contact between newborns and mothers and fathers must occur as soon as possible as it strongly influences the breast seeking behavior of the newborn and the relationship between newborn and parents.
  • It appears that, concerning the tactile approach of a newborn, mothers used finger tipping more, whereas fathers touched the infant more frequently with the palm of his hand.

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References

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