Regulation and Attachment in Infancy: Still-Face Paradigm and Joint Attention

Abstract

Attachment with the primary caregiver, the mother, in infancy is essential to later socioemotional development because its quality is carried forward to other important relationships. Attachment theorists argue that the attachment with the mother is formed and can be reliably measured by the first year of life. Prior to this point, infants develop internal-working models of the relationship with their mothers through repeated interactions. Infants regulation capacities before the first year reflect the internal-working models, and thus, may predict attachment security with the mother at the end of the first year. The present study assessed infants attachment security with the mother at 12 months and its associations with infants regulation in two different interaction contexts: emotion regulation in still-face paradigm at 6 months and attention regulation in joint attention at 9 months. The correlation analyses revealed that infants positive affect expressions and self-comforting behaviors during still-face paradigm at 6 months were positively correlated with supported joint attention at 9 months and attachment security at 12 months. The multiple regression analyses showed that the same variables at 6 months significantly predicted attachment security. Additionally, marginally significant moderator effect was found between infants positive affect expression at 6 months and attachment security at 12 months with coordinated joint attention at 9 months as a moderator.