A mother-instruction program: Documenting change in mother-child interactions

Measures of mother-child interaction change are reported in a series of 30 mothers and their children, aged 2 to 10. Videotaped play sessions were analyzed in detail to provide baseline measures from which individualized modification guidelines were derived. Mothers were instructed in eight weekly sessions via bug-in-the-ear. Postinstruction observations provided quantification of observed changes following instruction. The target of change was mother-child behavior contingency patterns, effected by intervening into the mother component on those patterns. Measured changes in mother and child behaviors, mother-child contingency patterns, and mother's preceptions of child behaviors are compared.