In this paper we apply a dynamic systems perspective to infant emotional development. We propose that emotions are not states but self‐organizing dynamic processes intimately tied to the flow of an individual's activity in a context. We review data on the relationship between emotional actions and the social context, in particular the development of smiling and laughter. These data are more adequately explained by our perspective than by other theories of emotional development. We provide a model for how emotional processes in early infancy become embedded into sociocultural systems, and suggest new avenues of research on emotional development.

No abstract

No abstract

In this chapter we present a summary of our recent work examining emotional development in infancy from a dynamic systems perspective. Our goal is to describe the studies that have evolved from our research group and to explain how these studies have been informed by dynamic systems thinking. Reviews of our dynamiC systems approach to emotional development can be found in the following works: Dickson, Fogel, and Messinger (forthcoming); Fogel and others (1992); Fogel, Nwokah, and Karns (1991); Fogel and Thelen (1987); and Messinger, Fogel, and Dickson (1997). Additional theoretical discussions of dYnamic systems approaches applied to emotion can be found in Camras (1992), Haviland and Kahlbaugh (1993), Lewis (1993), and Wolff (1987. We open this chapter with a theoretical overview, followed by a report on our work on the development of emotions related to the expressions of smiling and laughter during the first three years of life in the context of parentinfant play. Smiling is examined in the follOwing social contexts: during face-to-face mother-infant communication (from one to six months), during

Recordings were obtained of the laughter vocalizations of four 3-year-old children during three sessions of spontaneous free-play between mother and child in a laboratory playroom. Acoustic analysis was used to determine laughter durations, laughter events, F0, and harmonic characteristics, and to suggest a taxonomy of laughter types. Melodic contours were assessed from patterns of F0 change during laughter. Mean duration of laughs ranged from 200 ms to 2.0 s, but events within a laugh were usually about 200-ms duration. Laughs were intuitively classified into four major types, and, following the acoustic analyses, were further defined and classified into types and subtypes of exclamatory and dull comment; chuckle; basic, variable, and classical rhythmical; and squeal. Melodic contours included more rising contours than previously reported for cry, but there was great variability in the types of contours produced especially for rhythmical laughs. The results of the acoustic analyses are discussed in relation to (a) the development of a taxonomy of laughter and (b) different features of the vocal affect characteristics of high-intensity emotion.