Infants' sociality and developing capacity for group-related sensitivity amongst peers in centre-based child care.

Title: Infants’ sociality and developing capacity for group-related sensitivity amongst peers in centre-based child care.

Authors: Belinda Friezer, Linda Harrison & Sheena Elwick

Introduction: In centre-based child care, many similar aged infant peers are in the company of each other for long periods of time. Yet, little is known about infants’ sociality within their peer groups, and their developing capacity for a group-related sensitivity. We define infant group-related sensitivity as a developing awareness of: 1) the relationships between their peers, and; 2) their capacity to influence the relationship between their peers.

Aim: This research brings together key concepts of infant social development, dynamic systems theory, and educators’ perceptions in a mixed-methods design to identify the social developmental pathway of infants’ group-related sensitivity and the motivations that underlie this pathway.

Study Population: Participants were 45 infants from two Australian long day care centres who were observed across the first two years of life. Of the 45 infants, 20 were focus infants aged between 3 to 21-months (9 female; 12 male). Participants also included four educators who worked with and knew the infants well.

Methods: Micro-analytic and psychoanalytic observation research methods were applied. The 20 focus infants were filmed as the third infant in a triad (defined as a third infant and an interacting infant-peer dyad) every 2- to 3-months across a 12-month period. A reliable observational coding system was developed to identify triad interactions and code infant behaviours and behavioural sequences with their peers. A data set of 564 episodes was generated, coded and analysed using quantitative methods. In addition, each infant’s educators were interviewed while viewing video extracts of infant triads, generating 18 interviews that were transcribed and analysed using structural and thematic approaches.

Results: Analyses of coded videos showed that infants demonstrated a broad pattern of relating with peers that involved watching, approaching and engaging their interacting peers. Results indicate that the behaviours occurring within in this broad pattern of relating are not yet set. According to dynamics system theory, the findings suggest that infants are in a state of instability as they learn how to form and engage with members of a group. In terms of infant social development, infants engaging in this repeated pattern of relating are developing group-related sensitivity in peer groups. In this form of group-related sensitivity infants are developing: 1) a sensitivity to the interactions between their peers, and 2) an awareness of their capacity to influence the behaviour of their interacting peers.

Insights from educator interviews identified third infants’ motivations for engaging with peer-groups as: being curious and interested in their peers, working out the interactions between the dyad and seeking belonging and togetherness.

To conclude, infant-peer groups are dynamic linking systems consisting of specific moment-to-moment group processes that: (1) develop infants’ capacity for group-related sensitivity; (2) form the basis for longer term social developmental change in infants, and (3) serve to meet infants’ underlying desire for belonging in groups.