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The Relationship between Crawling and Emotion Discrimination in 9- to 10-Month-Old Infants
Gloria Gehb1, Michael Vesker1, Bianca Jovanovic1
1Developmental Psychology, Justus Liebig University Giessen, 35394 Giessen, Germany.
Brain Sciences
|April 21, 2022
Summary
Infants with more crawling experience show increased sensitivity to fearful facial expressions. This suggests motor development, like crawling, may enhance emotional perception in babies.
Area of Science:
- Developmental Psychology
- Infant Perception
- Emotional Development
Background:
- Infants' emotional perception is crucial for social interaction.
- The link between motor development and emotional sensitivity in infancy is not fully understood.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the relationship between infants' crawling experience and their sensitivity to fearful facial expressions.
- To determine if motor milestones influence the perception of emotions.
Main Methods:
- Utilized a preferential looking task with 29 infants aged 9-10 months.
- Presented infants with animated faces morphing between happy and fearful expressions.
- Measured looking times to assess sensitivity to fear cues.
Main Results:
- All infants, irrespective of crawling experience, looked longer at more fearful faces.
- Infants with at least 6 weeks of crawling experience detected fear at lower intensity levels.
- Crawling experience correlated with enhanced sensitivity to fear in facial expressions.
Conclusions:
- Crawling experience appears to enhance infants' ability to perceive fear in faces.
- Motor development may play a significant role in the maturation of emotional processing.
- Findings suggest a connection between embodied experience and socio-emotional development.
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