mother may then modulate her behaviors to influence the infant’s level
of arousal according to her perception of its current state,altering her
timing to incorporate the infant’s responses into the stream of interac-
tion (Mayer and Tronick 1985:212).Imitation and matching each other’s
vocalizations and facial expressions,both involuntary and deliberate,
contribute to mutual enjoyment and attunement.Benefits to Infants of Early Interactions
Early interactions provide a number of functional psychological and
sociocultural benefits for infants that go far beyond the physical protec-
tion and care that are typically cited as the function of attachment behav-
iors in the second half-year of life.1.They direct and modulate the infant’s state or level of attention and
arousal;for example,alert,soothe,praise,please (Fernald 1992:420).
2.They offer emotional regulation and support,thereby assisting the
infant to achieve a coherent homeostatic equilibrium (Hofer 1990) and
biobehavioral self-regulation (coping strategies) during mild stress
(Beebe and Lachmann 1994;Spangler et al.1994).
3.They provide acquaintance with the expressive (or prosodic) features
of language by which even adults gain important information about
others,such as sex,age,mood,and probable intentions (Fernald 1992;
Locke 1996).
4.They give exposure to the prototypical and meaningful sounds and
patterns of spoken language (Fernald 1992).
5.They develop cognitive abilities for recognizing agency,object,goal,
and instrumentality,a narrative-like mode of thought and perception or
“protonarrative envelope”(Stern 1995:92–93),and predispose the infant
generally to intellectual and social competence,including intentionality,
reciprocity,and expansion beyond the present situation (Hundeide
1991).
6.They reinforce neural structures predisposed for socioemotional func-
tioning (Schore 1994;Trevarthen and Aitken 1995).
7.They introduce cultural norms of appropriate behavior.
8.They assist in establishing physiological and emotional dyadic attune-
ment and reciprocity,enabling the pair to anticipate and adjust to each
other’s individual natures (Beebe,Jaffe,and Lachmann 1992),and laying
the foundation for later Bowlbian attachment.Quite clearly,early interactions with adults are adaptively beneficial
for infants (Hundeide 1991).For example,vocal rhythmic matching
ability at four months predicts attachment and cognition at one year
(Beebe,Lachmann,and Jaffe 1997).393 Antecedents of the Temporal Arts