Maternal Perception and Reactions to Infant' Crying as a Function of Easy-Difficult Infant Temperament

온순한 유아(乳兒)와 까다로운 유아(乳兒)의 울음에 대한 어머니의 지각(知覺)과 반응(反應)에 관한 연구(硏究)

The purpose of the present study was to examine the relationship between infants' crying associated with their temperament and mothers' subjective responses to their crying. The subjects were 212 mothers and their 4- to 8-month-old infants living in Seoul, Korea. RITQ and EASI were administered to mothers. Mothers' perceptions of tape recordings of infants' crying were recorded. The data were analyzed by t-test and ${\chi}^2$ test. The main results were that (1) infant's temperament could be divided into five groups: the easy, the intermediate-low, the intermediate-high, the difficult, and the slow-to-warm up infant groups. The more negatively emotional and impulsive the mother's temperament, the more difficult was the infant's temperament. (2)The crying of the difficult infants was perceived more as an indication of major physical discomfort than that of the easy infants. (3)Both mothers of difficult and mothers of easy infants displayed differences in maternal interventions by type of infant cries: cries of difficult infants elicited more maternal intervention of "soothing" or "picking up" than those of easy infants. On the other hand, cries of easy infants elicited more maternal intervention of "playing with toy" and "leaving him alone, if possible" than those of difficult infants.