Emotional availability and emotion communication in naturalistic mother-infant interactions: Evidence for gender relations

Mothers and their infants were observed during naturalistic home observatio ns when infants were on average 9 months, 12 months, and 14 months. Forty-s ix dyads (25 mother-daughter and 21 mother-son) were observed. The indices assessed in this study included global measures of emotional availability a nd discrete indices of emotion communication. Two analytic strategies were employed: (a) examination of mean differences in the different indices for mother-son versus mother-daughter dyads; and (b) examination of correlation al differences for boys versus girls among the different indices. No signif icant gender differences (i.e., mean differences) in emotional communicatio ns or emotional availability were found. Thus, mothers and infants are appr oximately equally emotionally communicative and emotionally available with their male versus female infants. However, an examination of the correlatio ns among the different indices of emotional availability and emotion commun ication revealed a different picture. These results revealed that affective ly positive mother-son interactions occur in the context of other emotional "positives," whereas affectively positive mother-daughter interactions occ ur in the context of greater emotional variety and range.