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Infant Crying pp 159–185Cite as

A Developmental Perspective of Infant Crying

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Abstract

Infant crying has great significance for many aspects of infant development and has thus been studied within a variety of contexts. In one context, crying is a salient social behavior of the newborn and young infant that influences the infant’s interactions with the caregiving environment. As such, researchers have examined the effects of crying on the responses of listeners (e.g., Frodi, Lamb, Leavitt, & Donovan, 1978) and the effects of those listeners’ responses on future expressions of crying (e.g., Bell & Ainsworth, 1972; Rheingold, Gewirtz, & Ross, 1959). Also within this context, investigators have examined variations in the expression of crying as they relate to different levels of infant arousal (e.g., Wolff, 1969) and different perceptions of why the infant is crying (e.g, Sherman, 1927). As a social behavior, we can study the development of crying as we would the development of other early social behaviors.

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  1. Department of Psychology, Virginia Polytechnic Intstitute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, 24061, USA

    Philip Sanford Zeskind

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  1. The Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA

    Barry M. Lester  & C. F. Zachariah Boukydis  & 

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Zeskind, P.S. (1985). A Developmental Perspective of Infant Crying. In: Lester, B.M., Zachariah Boukydis, C.F. (eds) Infant Crying. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-2381-5_8

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