Early Cognitive Development and Its Relation to Maternal Physiologic and Behavioral Responsiveness

Data are presented which support the hypothesis that infant cognitive development is a function of maternal responsiveness to infant cues. 22 mothers whose physiologic responses to infant signals had been recorded at an earlier date participated in the follow-up study reported here. Mother-infant dyads were videotaped during a feeding session when the infant was 9 months of age. Behavioral data collected were the mother's responses to her infant's facial orientation. The statistic developed to index maternal sensitivity was the rate of maternal responding during infant gaze/the rate of responding during infant looking away. Development of the object concept was assessed at 15 months using the Uzgiris and Hunt scale. The data indicated that the development of the concept of the object is positively related to maternal behavioral sensitivity and that mothers who were behaviorally sensitive to infant cues earlier had exhibited physiologic responses to infant signals.