a) Social referencing Earlier in this chapter, the students learned about the vi
ID: 3199619 • Letter: A
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a) Social referencing Earlier in this chapter, the students learned about the visual cliff expériment. This experiment tests both visual perception and emotional experience. That is,infants will not crawl to the "deep" if they a) perceive that it is deep and b) fear falling if they crawl to the "deep" side. But, what will infants side of the cliff ey are not sure whether the "deep" side is dangerous or not In one study by Sorce et al. (1985, Developmental Psychology), the researchers varied the height of the cliff until 1-year-old infants were not sure if it presented a dangerous situation or not. They then instructed mothers to make one of five emotional expressions: fear, anger, interest, happiness, or sadness. None of the babies who saw a fear expression crossed to the deep side of the cliff. Very few crossed if they saw an anger expression. About a third crossed upon seeing a sad facial expression, suggesting that not all negative facial expressions equally hinder crossing to the deep side of the cliff. Most babies crossed when they saw a happy or interested face. This study showed that infants will engage in social referencing when a situation is ambiguous (they did not engage in social referencing if the cliff was a lot deeper or a lot shallower) Some questions to ask might include what real life situations are analogous to this study? What is the role of the past relationship of the mom and baby (i.e., what would happen if you did this experiment with babies and strangers instead of their mothers)? What other modes of communicating emotions might infants be sensitive to (e.g., tone of voice, gestures, etc.)? What are the implications of this study for children of depressed mothers? The role of the past other and baby was to test the maturity of the mother and the babyExplanation / Answer
The visual cliff experiment tests both visual reception and emotional experience. Given a cliff infants were tested whether they craw the deep side of the cliff. In either case, (i) if they perceive that it is deep side of the cliff and they don’t crawl to the deep side of the cliff, (ii) secondly, the fear of falling into the deep and the danger involved in it stops them to crawl.
These two cases are regarding those who had the knowledge of deep and danger involved in it.
But what if the infants are unaware about the deepness and the danger involved in it. For this infants up to 1-year were trained through their mothers, by use of emotional expressions such as: fear, anger, interest, happiness, or sadness.
Then the experiments were performed and found that none of the babies who saw a fear expression crossed to deep side of the cliff. Very few crossed upon seeing an anger expression. About a third crossed upon seeing a sad facial expression. This suggests that all negative expressions don’t put similar kind of effect on the mind of infants. Most of the babies crossed when they saw a happy or interested face.
This shows clearly that facial expressions have importance in the emotional development of a child. This is called social referencing. That is infants will engage in social engineering when a situation is ambiguous (they did not engage in social engineering if the cliffs was a lot deeper or a lot shallower).
In real life we also like to follow the path which many others have already taken, and it is known that through that path people have not faced difficulties. Like joining a company, (if many people have shared good experiences about the company, then it is most likely that a person would like to joint it. Whereas if many people have shared bad experiences about the company, then it is least likely that a person would like to joint it.)
Similarly, while buying a product of some brand, we always try to find out how many people are using it, what are their experiences about the product, if it is good or better than some other brand for the same product then we buy it without bothering. If a product is advertised by a famous actor or personality, and some good points are mentioned then it is most likely that it will be sold very fast. Whereas if no advertisement and no proper information is available, then even if the product is good it is very unlikely that it will be sold effectively.Thus a good information or knowledge through social engineering can help people behave with both visual reception and emotional experience.
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