4.3: Emotional Development in Infants and Toddlers
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Learning Objectives
By the end of this section, you will be able to:
- Discuss the relationship between emotion , mood, and emotion regulation
- Distinguish between primary and secondary emotions
- Identify the important early milestones in emotion regulation
Kylie has been close to her nephew Jack since he was a newborn. In his infancy, Jack seemed to express only a few emotions, by either crying or smiling. By his first birthday, when he could play with his toys or feed himself, he clearly showed happiness over his skills. He also showed signs of sadness and distress when he was tired or overwhelmed. When Jack was two years old, Kylie noticed that he started to demonstrate other emotions, like shyness around new people and pride when he dressed himself.
As Jack’s emotions became more complex, he also developed the ability to cope with and control them. At first, he was limited to looking away, turning his head, or sucking his pacifier. Later, Kylie would watch him rub his blankets or his hair to calm down. As he grew, Jack started to display typical toddler behaviors such as tantrums, which included wiggling, screaming, and running away to express himself.
At each stage in his development, Kylie needed to shift her approach to help support Jack with his emotions, sometimes giving him comfort, and sometimes giving him space and time. Luckily, she also learned how to anticipate and predict his emotions, noting his cues when he was tired or overstimulated, or when he was becoming frustrated and angry. Understanding infant emotions can help caregivers provide sensitive and responsive care that can ensure a supportive home environment. This section discusses the development of emotions during the first few years of life and the emergence of the ability to regulate and identify emotions.
Life Hacks: Understanding Temper Tantrums
Ever hear of the terrible twos? The “terrible twos” is a term used in some countries to describe the increased independence and tantrums sometimes seen in toddlers. While toddlers are learning to say “no” and struggling with emotions, these tantrums can be quite manageable for those with a bit of lifespan development knowledge. Toddlers often become frustrated if they are overstimulated or tired, so those late afternoon outbursts may be a sign that they need some quiet time or a nap. Sometimes a snack can help too. Because they are still learning to communicate, toddlers can often feel misunderstood, so paying attention to their body language, especially any pointing or grunting, can help you anticipate their needs and prevent a misunderstanding. A good routine and promoting goodness of fit may even prevent many tantrums from ever happening. For example, prioritizing a regular bedtime for a toddler over a late-night social occasion may avoid a grumpy morning.
Toddlers are often seeking autonomy , or control over themselves, and tantrums can erupt when they feel forced to go to bed, get into the car, or eat their food when they have other priorities. Giving a toddler a sense of choice, even if it’s a false choice, can help them feel better. For instance, if a toddler resists getting dressed, you can ask if they’d like to put on their left or right sock first. This opportunity for choice gives toddlers a sense of autonomy so they are less likely to have a tantrum. Allowing them to try to do things for themselves, like feeding, dressing, and tidying toys, can also help give toddlers a sense of autonomy that can alleviate a tantrum. You could even let them leave the house in those clothes that don’t match if they seem proud of their fashion choice.
When a temper tantrum occurs (and they will), stay calm. Some toddlers prefer to cuddle to help calm them, but others don’t want to be touched because they already feel overstimulated. Make sure they are physically safe and not near any hazards. Give them time to cry and release their emotions. If they are crying because they want something they should not have, don’t reward them by letting them have it; instead, find another reward to give them once they are calm. Most important, try not to scream or get agitated yourself. This response will only escalate emotions and make the tantrum last longer.
Emotions
An emotion is the temporary affective state or feelings that influence our physiology, facial expressions, and motivations. In the first month of life, infants tend to show two emotional states: pleasure and displeasure (Watson & Tellegen, 1985). These two states differ by whether an infant is looking away or toward, is reaching or avoiding, and is calm or in distress (sometimes referred to as approach or withdrawal). By the end of the first year of life, infants can typically express a variety of emotions such as joy, sadness, anger, and fear. An infant may have a relatively stable and calm temperament or mood, but they can still experience a variety of emotions in a short window of time.
Mood and Arousal
It can be a challenge to distinguish between an infant’s moods and emotions when both involve our affect , or underlying feelings. Our moods are long-lasting dispositions that describe our level of arousal and pleasure (Figure 4.8). Like the temperamental dimensions of affect and intensity, moods describe an infant’s typical level of arousal and pleasure along two continuous spectrums (Hay, 2019; Yik et al., 1999). An infant who is experiencing a high level of arousal and a high level of pleasure might be described as in an excited mood, whereas an infant with low arousal and low pleasure might be lethargic in mood. An infinite number of points along both these dimensions can describe infant mood.
In the first weeks after birth, infants’ levels of arousal can also be described as various states of consciousness. Pediatrician Berry Brazelton identified six discrete states of infant arousal ranging from deep sleep to active alert (Brazelton, 1973). Initially, these six states help describe an infant as sleeping soundly or lightly, awake but drowsy, alert, or very active. Over the course of the first year, new emotional states gradually start to emerge that are different from Brazelton’s six stages. The first is a heightened sense of pleasure or joy that emerges around three to five months of age, and the second is a more potent sense of distress or displeasure, apparent around six to eight months of age (Hay, 2019).
Primary Emotions
Although adults can experience more than 220 unique emotions, Paul Ekman (1992, 1999) identified six primary emotions , biologically based feelings that appear early in the first year of life and are associated with distinct and universal facial expressions (Table 4.2). That is, people across cultures can recognize the facial expressions of primary emotions. These primary emotions are found in nearly all human cultures and are also displayed by individuals who are blind from birth, suggesting they are biologically innate. In other words, across cultures and individual differences, many individuals show these same facial expressions corresponding to each of the six primary emotions. Another theorist, Carroll Izard (1977, 1991), initially identified ten primary emotions that appear early in infancy, and Robert Levenson identified emotions that have evolutionary adaptive features (Mauss et al., 2005). Although each of these theories is unique, they have considerable overlap and agree on the existence of six primary emotions: joy, sadness, fear, anger, disgust, and surprise (Tracy & Randles, 2011).
| Emotion | Facial Expression |
|---|---|
| Joy | Individual smiles, raises cheekbones, creases corners of the eyes |
| Sadness | Individual frowns, raises inner eyebrows, and may show tears |
| Fear | Individual widens eyes and stretches corners of the mouth |
| Anger | Individual moves eyebrows and corners of the mouth downward |
| Disgust | Individual crinkles nose, closes eyes, and may stick out tongue |
| Surprise | Individual widens eyes and opens mouth wide |
Link to Learning
Review this short video about how theories of early emotions gave us our current idea of primary emotions to learn more.
Secondary Emotions
Primary emotions can help infants communicate their needs, but there is a limit to how much they can express. Starting around eighteen months, secondary emotions begin to emerge (Lewis & Sullivan, 2005). Complex and specific to the situation, secondary emotions require infants to have a sense of self and therefore know who they are as opposed to who others are. Secondary emotions include emotions such as pride, embarrassment, jealousy, and empathy.
Secondary emotions in which a toddler becomes aware of how others view them are called self-conscious emotions . A toddler who believes they are viewed positively by others may feel emotions such as pride and confidence. If aware they are viewed negatively by others, they may feel emotions such as guilt, shame, or embarrassment.
Secondary emotions can also correspond to the way infants perceive others (Trevarthen, 2005). With these other-evaluative emotion s, or relational emotions, infants can judge others positively, such as with love and empathy (Lewis et al., 1989; Park & Lewis, 2021). Other-evaluative emotions that judge others negatively include jealousy and envy.
Emotion Regulation
Emotions are powerful and can be overwhelming. In infancy, regulating emotions is a difficult task because infants are limited in their coping strategies (Thomas et al., 2017). The ability to calm ourselves and move from a state of high arousal to a state of lower arousal is called emotion regulation . Infants are often dependent on their caregiver to help them calm down, with the caregiver and child forming a dyad, or a pair of individuals who influence one another. A good means for doing so is a process called dyadic regulation , in which a caregiver calmly holds, cuddles, and touches an infant to help them slow their breathing and heart rate (Figure 4.9) Dyadic regulation can also make use of distraction, such as rocking, feeding, bathing, or singing to an infant (Atkinson et al., 2021).
Dyadic regulation and emotion regulation are also supported by synchrony , or when caregivers and children are responding to each other’s emotions in reciprocal and sensitive ways (Feldman. 2007; Kerr et al., 2021). For example, when a father and infant smile or giggle while making eye contact, they are demonstrating good synchrony. When caregivers demonstrate sensitivity and responsiveness to their infant’s emotions, it can lower infant negative emotions and improve infant regulation (Abney et al., 2021; Gartstein et al., 2018). Understanding regulation strategies, the role of culture in emotion regulation, and emotional awareness will help you in your encounters, both personal and professional, with young children.
Regulation Strategies
A newborn who is overwhelmed and overstimulated may develop the regulation strategy of attentional distraction , such as by turning their head away and closing their eyes (Atkinson et al., 2021). As infants grow and can move and crawl, they can begin to use attentional distraction to move away from upsetting situations such as loud appliances in the home and toward calming situations, such as interesting toys.
When infants and toddlers are distressed and upset, self-soothing skills such as sucking that directly target the level of arousal can help regulate their heart rate and breathing (Atkinson et al., 2021). Many infants learn to use sucking as their first self-soothing technique, whether sucking on a bottle, a pacifier, a toy, or their thumb. Another self-soothing technique is touching and rubbing blankets, soft toys, or hair to calm down.
By the second year of life, young toddlers also engage in attention-seeking behaviors to help regulate themselves. These behaviors include crying and calling out for a caregiver, reaching and turning toward an adult, and wanting to be held or cuddled (Atkinson et al., 2021). Finally, near twenty-four months of age, escape behavior begins to emerge, in which toddlers attempt to hide, protest, avoid, and rebuke activities or experiences that bring them distress. An overtired or upset toddler may hide their face and curl on the floor, run to a corner, or throw items away to exit the activity they find upsetting. By being aware of an infant’s age, resources, and tools for emotion regulation, caregivers can begin helping them develop self-regulation skills over the first few years of life.
Supporting young infants and toddlers with emotion regulation skills has long-term benefits. Parents and caregivers who more often hold and cuddle their infants and respond to them with close soothing tend to more effectively promote infant development and soothability (Kiel et al., 2024). Moreover, caregivers who are sensitive to infants’ and toddlers’ nonverbal cues such as attentional distraction, attention-seeking, and escape behaviors can anticipate their emotional needs and prevent emotions from escalating into distress (Abney et al., 2021; Thomas et al., 2017). Finally, parents and caregivers who provide a supportive routine with adequate sleep and quiet time, regular feeding, and opportunities to move and wiggle can help toddlers to be well-rested and fed, which can help with the development of independent self-soothing behaviors (Kim et al., 2014).
Culture and Emotion Regulation
Emotion regulation skills may be culturally dependent. In a large-scale study, Harkness and colleagues (2007) found that U.S. families supported emotion regulation by supplying interesting and stimulating environments, whereas Dutch families focused on providing structure and routine. Italian families emphasized touch and tactile comfort, whereas Korean families prioritized physical well-being and routine (Harkness et al., 2007). Finally, Japanese American and European American infant-mother dyads showed similar person-oriented interaction and socialization behaviors, whereas Japanese infant-mother dyads showed more object-oriented interactions (Bornstein et al., 2012). Person-oriented interactions involve things like turn taking and face-to-face interactions, while object-oriented interactions involve the caregiver and infant interacting by both focusing on objects such as a toy. A variety of strategies across cultures can promote emotion learning and regulation (Friedlmeier et al., 2015).
Emotional Awareness
Along with emotion regulation, young infants and toddlers are beginning to develop a sense of emotional awareness , insight into their own emotional state and those of others (Figure 4.10). The process of recognizing and identifying our current affective state is called emotional labeling (Elsayed et al., 2021). Caregivers who assist toddlers with this skill help provide them with an important self-care tool to articulate and understand themselves (Nencheva et al., 2023). For example, a caregiver using emotional labeling might help a crying toddler identify their feelings and experiences by saying, “I know. You’re sad because big brother left to go to school, but he’ll be back.” Finally, recognizing emotions in others can help toddlers develop secondary emotions such as empathy and compassion (Spinrad & Gal, 2018).
Taken together, emotion regulation and emotional awareness are the building blocks for emotional intelligence, the ability to understand emotions and motivations in yourself and others (Mayer et al., 2011). Although many emotional milestones are accomplished in the first two years of life, there are many emotional tasks beyond a toddler’s ability. For instance, delay of gratification, or regulating happy and excited emotions to stay calm, will not start to develop until age four years. Knowing an infant’s or toddler’s developmental abilities and limits can aid caregivers and those who work with children, such as teachers and pediatric nurses or doctors, in promoting emotion development and regulation.
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