2.1.

Prenatal Development
The development of a person begins much before his/her birth and the stage of development
before birth is prenatal development stage. The sperm from father unites with a cell called
egg or ovum in the mother. The sperm enters into the layers of walls surrounding the egg and
unites with it. This process is called fertilization or conception. As a result a single cell is
produced which is called zygote and this is how life begins - as a single cell which cannot
even be seen with eyes takes up the journey of development finally to become a complete
person! Don't you think it is wonderfully intricate and a beautiful marvel of creation?
Prenatal development covers the period from fertilization to birth. It comprises of three
stages:
2.1.1. stages of prenatal Development
i) The period of zygote: It lasts from fertilisation to two weeks. It continues to move down
the ovarian tube or oviduct to the uterus. For 4-5 days it floats freely in the uterine cavity.
Around the fourth day after fertilization the zygote digs into the wall of the uterus and
attaches itself firmly, a process called implantation. The wall of the uterus envelops it. Rapid
mitotic cell division takes place and the single cell zygote after repeated divisions resembles a
ball with two layers of cells.
ii) The period of the embryo: It extends from 2 weeks to 2 months. During this time the
embryo is like a miniature human being. Cell differentiation takes place, that is, from one
cell, different types of cells arise. External features such as head, face, hands, fingers, legs
can be clearly seen and interior organs such as heart lungs and brain are formed. The embryo
turns within the uterus and the heart beat can be heard. The first twelve weeks are very
crucial because, it is during this period, the important organs are formed.
iii) The third stage is the period of the foetus: It extends from the beginning of the third
month till birth. The body proportions increase as growth ' continues. Activity of the foetus
can be felt. All the internal organs are formed and by 5"' month they assume actual
proportions. Between 2-4Ih month the nervous system develops. On completion of 9 months
or 270 days, the foetus is ready for birth.
2.1.2. Influences in prenatal stage: There are several factors which affect the development
during the prenatal stage. These factors are collectively called as teratogens.
1) Maternal nutrition: In order to grow, the foetus needs nutrients which in turn come from
the mother. Mother's dietary intake must be balanced. Care must be given to include vitamins
and minerals (such as calcium, phosphate, iron) water, proteins, fats and not carbohydrates
alone. Vegetables, green leaves, seasonal fruits, pulses and cereals in addition to milk, eggs
and meat or fish provide a diet adequate for the baby and the mother.
2) Maternal age: Between the ages of 21 to 29 years is the ideal age of the mother to have
children. Below this bracket the mother is too immature physiologically and psychologically
with a high risk of infant death. Beyond 30, risk of incidence of mental retardation and other
genetic abnormalities is very high.
3) Rest and exercise of the mother: These are essential specially during pregnancy. When
the mother is tired and over worked the foetal activity increases and beyond limits it can
cause still birth or irritability of the child. At the same time mother must have adequate
exercise.
4) Rh blood group: Majority of us are Rh+ while some have Rh- blood group. If the mother
is Rh- and the foetus is Rh+ then it is an incompatible condition. The mother must be aware
of it and at the time of delivery, if precautions are not adequate then complication such as
jaundice can occur and may result in infant death.
5) Addictions: If the mother is addicted to alcohol, cigarettes or drugs the waste material is
passed onto the foetus. Risk of irritability, low birth weight or prematurity, even still birth or
child being born with addictions are very high.
6) Maternal diseases: The diseases of the mother can significantly affect the foetus.
Specially during the initial critical times during pregnancy. German measles or Rubella can
cause deafness, mental retardation or even heart trouble. AIDS, Syphilis or other sexually
transmitted diseases can cause miscarriage.
7) Maternal stress: When the mother has emotional problems, tensions and anxieties, blood
supply to the foetus is not adequate, but is diverted. Therefore, growth is hindered. This also
can result in prematurity, still birth or the child being irritable.
Prenatal development comes to an end with the onset of the birth process. Birth can be
normal and -spontaneous or assisted. The foetus may suffer difficulties and complication,
specially lack of oxygen or anoxia. In case of complication assistance is required as in
assisted birth such as instrumental birth or caesarean section. In such assisted birth care must
be ensured for the health of the new born.
2.2. Infancy
2.2.1 The concept of infancy

A child goes through the various stages in his full life such as infancy, childhood,
adolescence, adulthood and lastly old age. This is the beginning period for a child and fastest
period. Infancy period is defined in many areas, some by medical practitioners who define
this period as of the period of young child. They do not specify any age limits. Some
psychologists use the word infant in much the same way as members of the medical
profession do. Infant is minor and is struggling for reaching the age of legal maturity. He is so
helpless person and dependent on other persons. The first two years of an individual’s life are
the time of his most rapid development. Although every child develops at its own rate, each
grows up in an orderly and predictable pattern. Cephalocaudally means the development
takes place from head to tail and proximodistally means from trunk to extremes.

The behaviour and ability of 2-year-old children are different from that of older children. The
two-year-old children can eat, cry, move, babble, play, kick, and smile. Two-year-old children
has the absence of qualities such as the ability to speak, to act with intention, to reason, to be
self-conscious, and to experience the emotion of guilty, empathy and pride. Psychologists like
Sigmund Freud, Erik Erikson and Jean Piaget highlighted a different aspect of an infant
because each was loyal to assumptions that were part of the larger cultural context in which
they lived.

2.2.2. Characteristics of Infancy Period

The characteristics of infancy period are as follows: i) The infancy period is the shortest
period of whole life-span development. It start’s from birth to two years. This is the time
when foetus comes into the world from the mother’s womb where he lives almost nine
critical months. ii) Adjustment is equally important to the infant as he has to adjust with the
outer surroundings. Most of the infants complete their adjustment period in two weeks or less
than two weeks. In infants whose birth has been difficult or premature require more time for
adjustment. iii) Infancy period is a plateau in development. The growth and development
which took place during the prenatal period suddenly come to a stop with birth. Infant loses
weight after birth, is less healthy compared to what it was at the time of birth. At the end of
this period infant again starts gaining weight. iv) Bell, R.Q. et. al. (1971) suggested that
infancy is a period of future prediction. We can start some future prediction about the
infant. Some activities show the prediction of development. It is a preview of later
development. v) Infancy is considered a period full of hazards in terms of physical and
psychological adjustment. Physical adjustment to the new environment is difficult for the
child. The attitudes of the family members create more difficult situation for the infant.
Psychologically, the attitude of significant toward the infant gets crystallized. This attitude
changes from one stage to another.

2.2.3. Adjustments During Infancy

As already discussed, infants have to make certain important adjustments after birth. They
have to make these changes quickly for their better development. If they are not able to effect
those changes, they may face some problems regarding their adjustment. Even they may
regress to a lower stage of development. There are four major adjustments during infancy
period, which are described below: i) Temperature changes: There is a constant temperature
of 100-degree F in the uterine sac, while temperature in the hospital or home may vary from
60 to 70-degree F. ii) Breathing: When the umbilical cord is cut, infant must begin to breathe
on its own. iii) Sucking and Swallowing: The infant must now get nourishment by sucking
and swallowing, instead of receiving it through the umbilical cord. These reflexes are
imperfectly developed at birth, and the infant often gets less nourishment than is needed and
thus loses weight. iv) Elimination: The infant’s organs of elimination begin to work soon
after birth. Earlier, the waste products were eliminated through the umbilical cord.

2.2.4. Hazards During Infancy Period

As mentioned earlier, the period of infancy is the shortest period of development for a child.
In this short time there are many hazards. These hazards may be classified as physical and
psychological hazards.

1) Physical hazards: The physical hazards of infancy though of low significance, its effect
on infant can affect the entire life span of the child. Some physical hazards are given below:
i) Complication at the time of birth: If the mother has some complications at the time of
birth or delivery, chances of the child getting physically injured are high. A caesarean birth is
likely to result in anoxia, a temporary loss of oxygen to the brain. If the anoxia is severe,
brain damage will be far greater than if anoxia lasts for only a few seconds. The more
complicated the birth and the more damage there is to the brain tissue, greater will be the
effect on the infant’s postnatal life and adjustment. The use of too much medicine at the time
of birth may lead to a serious complication. ii) Multiple births: Children of multiple births
are usually smaller and weaker than singletons as a result of crowding during the pre natal
period, which inhibits foetal movements. These infants tend to be born pre mature, which
adds to their adjustment problems. iii) Post maturity: If the size of foetus is large then at the
time of birth, there may be a need to use instruments or surgery which becomes hazardous to
the infant. Critical conditions of birth may create a hazard for the infant. v) Pre maturity:
The condition of pre maturity may at times be the cause of death of the infant. Prematurely
born infants are also especially susceptible to brain damage. Anoxia is another problem when
premature infant’s respiratory mechanism is not fully developed. This effect may be such that
it can also be long lasting.

2) Psychological hazards: Like physical hazards some psychological hazards also affect the
infancy period. Some of these are: i) Traditional beliefs about birth: There are many
traditional beliefs associated with birth. These beliefs also affect the development of the
child. For e.g. some people believe that those children born with difficult births, have difficult
life situation. Some believe that there is some good time or event during the birth. But there is
less scientific evidence to support these beliefs. ii) Helplessness: Helplessness is another
struggle for the infant in outer world. At the time of birth infants are in hospital and under the
care of many doctors and nurses. The helplessness of the newborn is more of a psychological
hazard in the case of first born children than of later-born children. iii) Attitude of parents:
The attitude of the parents may be changed at the time of birth. There are many reasons to
change this attitude toward the infant such as gender preferences, excessive crying and
difficulty in nourishment, complication at the time of birth and unexpected arrival of
twins and triplets. The mother’s attitude is more important for the infant because infants are
in direct touch with their mother.

2.2.5. Physical Development In Infancy

Physical Growth: The first year of infant is characterised by rapid physical growth. A normal
baby doubles its birth weight in six months and triples it in a year. During that time, there
is great expansion of the head and chest, thus permitting development of the brain, heart, and
lungs, the organs most vital to survival. The bones, which are relatively soft at birth, begin to
harden, and the fontanelles, the soft parts of the newborn skull, begin to calcify, the small one
at the back of the head at about 3 months, the larger one in front at varying ages up to 18
months. Brain weight also increases rapidly during infancy: by the end of the second year, the
brain has already reached 75% of its adult weight.

The average newborn weighs approximately 7.5 pounds, although a healthy birth weight for a
full-term baby is considered to be between 5 pounds, 8 ounces (2,500 grams) and 8 pounds,
13 ounces (4,000 grams). The average length of a newborn is 19.5 inches, increasing to 29.5
inches by 12 months and 34.4 inches by 2 years old (WHO Multicentre Growth Reference
Study Group, 2006).

For the first few days of life, infants typically lose about 5 percent of their body weight as
they eliminate waste and get used to feeding. This often goes unnoticed by most parents, but
can be cause for concern for those who have a smaller infant. This weight loss is temporary,
however, and is followed by a rapid period of growth. By the time an infant is 4 months old,
it usually doubles in weight, and by one year has tripled its birth weight. By age 2, the weight
has quadrupled. The average length at 12 months (one year old) typically ranges from 28.5-
30.5 inches. The average length at 24 months (two years old) is around 33.2-35.4 inches
(CDC, 2010).
Body Proportions: Another dramatic physical change that takes place in the first several years
of life is a change in body proportions. The head initially makes up about 50 percent of a
person’s entire length when developing in the womb. At birth, the head makes up about 25
percent of a person’s length (just imagine how big your head would be if the proportions
remained the same throughout your life!). In adulthood, the head comprises about 15 percent
of a person’s length. Imagine how difficult it must be to raise one’s head during the first year
of life! And indeed, if you have ever seen a 2- to 4-month-old infant lying on their stomach
trying to raise the head, you know how much of a challenge this is.
Growth and size depend on environmental conditions as well as genetic endowment.
For example, severe nutritional deficiency during the mother’s pregnancy and in infancy are
likely to result in an irreversible impairment of growth and intellectual development, while
overfed, fat infants are predisposed to become obese later in life. Human milk provides the
basic nutritional elements necessary for growth; however, in Western cultures supplemental
foods are generally added to the diet during the first year.

The newborn infant sleeps almost constantly, awakening only for feedings, but the number
and length of waking periods gradually increases. By the age of three months, most infants
have acquired a fairly regular schedule for sleeping, feeding, and bowel movements. By the
end of the first year, sleeping and waking hours are divided about equally.

Maturation: Maturation refers to a universal sequence of biological events in the central

nervous system that permits a psychological function to appear, assuming that the child is
physically healthy and lives in an environment containing people and objects. Maturation
cannot cause a psychological function to occur; it only sets the limits on the earliest time of
its appearance. Biological events in youth consider as maturation, when they grow between
12 to 15 years. It is an age of maturation and releases hormones from the pituitary gland
located at the brain. But environmental factors, such as the quality of nutrition during
childhood, can accelerate the emergence of puberty by several years.

Brain development:
Some of the most dramatic physical change that occurs during this period is in the brain. At
birth, the brain is about 25 percent of its adult weight, and this is not true for any other part of
the body. By age 2, it is at 75 percent of its adult weight, at 95 percent by age 6, and at 100
percent by age 7 years.
While most of the brain’s 100 to 200 billion neurons are present at birth, they are not fully
mature. Each neural pathway forms thousands of new connections during infancy and
toddlerhood. During the next several years, dendrites, or connections between neurons, will
undergo a period of transient exuberance or temporary dramatic growth (exuberant because
it is so rapid and transient because some of it is temporary). There is a proliferation of these
dendrites during the first two years so that by age 2, a single neuron might have thousands of
dendrites. After this dramatic increase, the neural pathways that are not used will be
eliminated through a process called pruning, thereby making those that are used much
stronger. It is thought that pruning causes the brain to function more efficiently, allowing for
mastery of more complex skills (Hutchinson, 2011). Transient exuberance occurs during the
first few years of life, and pruning continues through childhood and into adolescence in
various areas of the brain. This activity is occurring primarily in the cortex or the thin outer
covering of the brain involved in voluntary activity and thinking.
2.2.6. Motor development and sensory development

From Reflexes to Voluntary Movements: Every basic motor skill (any movement ability)
develops over the first two years of life. The sequence of motor skills first begins
with reflexes. Infants are equipped with a number of reflexes, or involuntary movements in
response to stimulation, and some are necessary for survival. These include the breathing
reflex, or the need to maintain an oxygen supply (this includes hiccups, sneezing, and
thrashing reflexes), reflexes that maintain body temperature (crying, shivering, tucking the
legs close, and pushing away blankets), the sucking reflex, or automatically sucking on
objects that touch their lips, and the rooting reflex, which involves turning toward any object
that touches the cheek (which manages feeding, including the search for a nipple). Other
reflexes are not necessary for survival, but signify the state of brain and body functions.
Some of these include: the babinski reflex (toes fan upward when feet are stroked), the
stepping reflex (babies move their legs as if to walk when feet touch a flat surface), the
palmar grasp (the infant will tightly grasp any object placed in its palm), and the moro reflex
(babies will fling arms out and then bring to chest if they hear a loud noise). These
movements occur automatically and are signals that the infant is functioning well
neurologically. Within the first several weeks of life, these reflexes are replaced with
voluntary movements or motor skills.
Motor development: Motor development occurs in an orderly sequence as infants move
from reflexive reactions (e.g., sucking and rooting) to more advanced motor functioning. This
development proceeds in a cephalocaudal (from head-down) and proximodistal (from center-
out) direction. For instance, babies first learn to hold their heads up, then sit with assistance,
then sit unassisted, followed later by crawling, pulling up, cruising, and then walking. As
motor skills develop, there are certain developmental milestones that young children should
achieve. For each milestone, there is an average age, as well as a range of ages in which the
milestone should be reached. An example of a developmental milestone is a baby holding up
its head. Babies on average are able to hold up their head at 6 weeks old, and 90% of babies
achieve this between 3 weeks and 4 months old. If a baby is not holding up his head by 4
months old, he is showing a delay. On average, most babies sit alone at 7 months old. Sitting
involves both coordination and muscle strength, and 90% of babies achieve this milestone
between 5 and 9 months old (CDC, 2018). If the child is displaying delays on several
milestones, that is a reason for concern, and the parent or caregiver should discuss this with
the child’s paediatrician. Some developmental delays can be identified and addressed through
early intervention.
Gross Motor Skills: Gross motor skills are voluntary movements that involve the use of
large muscle groups and are typically large movements of the arms, legs, head, and torso.
These skills begin to develop first. Examples include moving to bring the chin up when lying
on the stomach, moving the chest up, rocking back and forth on hands and knees. But it also
includes exploring an object with one’s feet as many babies do, as early as 8 weeks of age, if
seated in a carrier or other device that frees the hips. This may be easier than reaching for an
object with the hands, which requires much more practice (Berk, 2007). And sometimes an
infant will try to move toward an object while crawling and surprisingly move backward
because of the greater amount of strength in the arms than in the legs!
Fine Motor Skills: Fine motor skills are more exact movements of the hands and fingers and
include the ability to reach and grasp an object. These skills focus on the muscles in the
fingers, toes, and eyes, and enable coordination of small actions (e.g., grasping a toy, writing
with a pencil, and using a spoon). Newborns cannot grasp objects voluntarily but do wave
their arms toward objects of interest. At about 4 months of age, the infant is able to reach for
an object, first with both arms and within a few weeks, with only one arm. Grasping an object
involves the use of the fingers and palm, but no thumbs. Stop reading for a moment and try to
grasp an object using the fingers and the palm. How does that feel? How much control do you
have over the object? If it is a pen or pencil, are you able to write with it? Can you draw a
picture? The answer is, probably not. Use of the thumb comes at about 9 months of age when
the infant is able to grasp an object using the forefinger and thumb (the pincer grasp). This
ability greatly enhances the ability to control and manipulate an object, and infants take great
delight in this newfound ability. They may spend hours picking up small objects from the
floor and placing them in containers. By 9 months, an infant can also watch a moving object,
reach for it as it approaches, and grab it. This is quite a complicated set of actions if we
remember how difficult this would have been just a few months earlier.
Sensory Development
As infants and children grow, their senses play a vital role in encouraging and stimulating the
mind and in helping them observe their surroundings. Two terms are important to understand
when learning about the senses. The first is sensation, or the interaction of information with
the sensory receptors. The second is perception, or the process of interpreting what is sensed.
It is possible for someone to sense something without perceiving it. Gradually, infants
become more adept at perceiving with their senses, making them more aware of their
environment and presenting more affordances or opportunities to interact with objects.
Vision: What can young infants see, hear, and smell? Newborn infants’ sensory abilities are
significant, but their senses are not yet fully developed. Many of a newborn’s innate
preferences facilitate interaction with caregivers and other humans. The womb is a dark
environment void of visual stimulation. Consequently, vision is the most poorly developed
sense at birth. Newborns typically cannot see further than 8 to 16 inches away from their
faces, have difficulty keeping a moving object within their gaze, and can detect contrast more
than color differences. If you have ever seen a newborn struggle to see, you can appreciate
the cognitive efforts being made to take in visual stimulation and build those neural pathways
between the eye and the brain.
Although vision is their least developed sense, newborns already show a preference for faces.
When you glance at a person, where do you look? Chances are you look into their eyes. If so,
why? It is probably because there is more information there than in other parts of the
face. Newborns do not scan objects this way; rather, they tend to look at the chin or another
less detailed part of the face. However, by 2 or 3 months, they will seek more detail when
visually exploring an object and begin showing preferences for unusual images over familiar
ones, for patterns over solids, faces over patterns, and three-dimensional objects over flat
images. Newborns have difficulty distinguishing between colors, but within a few months are
able to distinguish between colors as well as adults. Infants can also sense depth as binocular
vision develops at about 2 months of age. By 6 months, the infant can perceive depth in
pictures as well (Sen, Yonas, & Knill, 2001). Infants who have experience crawling and
exploring will pay greater attention to visual cues of depth and modify their actions
accordingly (Berk, 2007).
Hearing: The infant’s sense of hearing is very keen at birth. If you remember from an earlier
module, this ability to hear is evidenced as soon as the 5th month of prenatal development. In
fact, an infant can distinguish between very similar sounds as early as one month after birth
and can distinguish between a familiar and non-familiar voice even earlier. Babies who are
just a few days old prefer human voices, they will listen to voices longer than sounds that do
not involve speech (Vouloumanos & Werker, 2004), and they seem to prefer their mother’s
voice over a stranger’s voice (Mills & Melhuish, 1974). In an interesting experiment, 3-week-
old babies were given pacifiers that played a recording of the infant’s mother’s voice and of a
stranger’s voice. When the infants heard their mother’s voice, they sucked more strongly at
the pacifier (Mills & Melhuish, 1974). Some of this ability will be lost by 7 or 8 months as a
child becomes familiar with the sounds of a particular language and less sensitive to sounds
that are part of an unfamiliar language.
Pain and Touch: Immediately after birth, a newborn is sensitive to touch and temperature,
and is also sensitive to pain, responding with crying and cardiovascular responses. Newborns
who are circumcised (the surgical removal of the foreskin of the penis) without anesthesia
experience pain, as demonstrated by increased blood pressure, increased heart rate, decreased
oxygen in the blood, and a surge of stress hormones (United States National Library of
Medicine, 2016). According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), there are medical
benefits and risks to circumcision. They do not recommend routine circumcision, however,
they stated that because of the possible benefits (including prevention from urinary tract
infections, penile cancer, and some STDs) parents should have the option to circumcise their
sons if they want to (AAP, 2012).
The sense of touch is acute in infants and is essential to a baby’s growth of physical abilities,
language and cognitive skills, and socio-emotional competency. Touch not only impacts
short-term development during infancy and early childhood but also has long-term effects,
suggesting the power of positive gentle touch from birth. Through touch, infants learn about
their world, bond with their caregiver, and communicate their needs and wants. Research
emphasizes the great benefits of touch for premature babies, but the presence of such contact
has been shown to benefit all children (Stack, D. M. (2010). In an extreme example, some
children in Romania were reared in orphanages in which a single care worker may have had
as many as 10 infants to care for at one time. These infants were not often helped or given
toys with which to play. As a result, many of them were developmentally delayed (Nelson,
Fox, & Zeanah, 2014). When we discuss emotional and social development later in this
module, you will also see the important role that touch plays in helping infants feel safe and
protected, which builds trust and secure attachments between the child and their caregiver.
Taste and Smell: Not only are infants sensitive to touch, but newborns can also distinguish
between sour, bitter, sweet, and salty flavors and show a preference for sweet flavors. They
can distinguish between their mother’s scent and that of others, and prefer the smell of their
mothers. A newborn placed on the mother’s chest will inch up to the mother’s breast, as it is a
potent source of the maternal odor. Even on the first day of life, infants orient to their
mother’s odor and are soothed, when crying, by their mother’s odor (Sullivan et al., 2011).
2.2.7. Psycho-social Development in Infancy

Psychosocial development is the development of a person’s understanding of the

environment they are living in, and figuring out how that relates to them, their behaviour,
and others. To put it in even simpler terms, it is learning about yourself, through your
surroundings and other people.

The theory of psychosocial development is given by the psychoanalyst Erik Erikson. It is

perhaps one of the best ways to understand the psychosocial development in infancy period.
He describes the impact of social experience across the whole lifespan and it is one of the
better theories of personality. Erikson has characterised infancy as the period during which
the child develops basic and long-lasting expectations about his world.

The central idea of Erikson’s psychosocial stage theory is the development of ego identity.
Ego identity refers to the conscious sense of self that we develop through social interaction.
According to Erikson, our ego identity is constantly changing due to new experience and
information we acquire in our daily interactions with others. Erikson also believed that a
sense of competence also motivates behaviours and actions. Each stage is concerned with
becoming competent in an area of life. If the stage is handled well, the person will feel a
sense of mastery, which he sometimes referred to as ego strength or ego quality. If the stage is
managed poorly, the person will emerge with a sense of inadequacy. Erikson also believed in
each stage, people experience a conflict that serves as a turning point in development. These
conflicts are centered on either developing a psychological quality or failing to develop that
quality. During these times, the potential for personal growth is high, but so is the potential
for failure.

The psychosocial theory include the Stage 1 - Trust vs. Mistrust (birth to 1 years). The first
stage of Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development occurs between birth and one year of
age and is the most fundamental stage in life. Because an infant is purely dependent on their
family members, the development of trust is based on the dependability and quality of the
child’s caregivers. If an infant successfully develops trust, he or she will feel safe and secure
in the world. Caregivers who are inconsistent, emotionally unavailable, or rejecting
contribute to feelings of mistrust in the children they care for. Failure to develop trust will
result in fear and a belief that the world is inconsistent and unpredictable. Trust and mistrust
is the main feature of infant development. A sense of trust requires a feeling of physical
comfort and a minimal amount of fear and apprehension about the future. Trust in infancy
sets the stage for a lifelong expectation that the world will be a pleasant place to live.

The infancy stage focuses on the infant’s basic needs, being met by the parents. If the
parents expose the child to warmth, regularly, and dependable affection, the infant’s view of
the world will be one of trust. If the parents fail to provide a secure environment and fail to
meet the child’s basic need, a sense of mistrust will result. If proper balance is achieved, the
child will develop the virtue hope, the strong beliefs that, even when things are not going
well, they will work out well in the end. Failing this, maladaptive tendency or sensory
distortion may develop and the malignant tendency of withdrawal will develop.

2.2.8. Emotional states

i) Attachment: A new born baby in arms is the greatest feeling of motherhood. An infant
always seek love and attention from mother and he cries to be pick up, fed, and otherwise
stimulated and often as not he cries when put down. At six weeks, infant will smile at his
mother face and grasp his cloth. At this age infant can recognise their caretaker and his faces.
He needs mother’s and father’s attention towards him. This early attachment is called
‘indiscriminate’; the infant seeks stimulation rather than any particular person. The concept of
attachment is investigated by Ainsworth and her associates (1978), was defined as an
emotionally toned relationship or tie to the mother that led the infant to seek mother presence
and comfort, particularly when the infant was frightened or uncertain. This indicates that all
healthy infants have healthy and strong attachment with their caretakers and this strong
bonding provides the basis for healthy emotional and social development during later
childhood.
ii) Smiling: Smiling is the means of communication for infants in early years. An early smile
of the infant is just a facial exercise of the muscles. A child first pass his smile to his mother
and this is at first bestowed indiscriminately between the mother and child. The smile is an
important influence on mother – child relationship. The mother’s responsive smile is equally
important to the child. It transforms the spontaneous smile of the infant into an exchange.
This may be called first real social interaction. The social smile appears at 7 or 8 weeks of
age, and by 3 months infants will smile almost any face. This smile is important to the
caretakers and child because it invites adult to interact with the baby and therefore contributes
to the attachment bonding.
iii) Anxiety: As we all know that mother and child relation is important in infancy period.
The child first recognised his mother face and infant is aware that mother is special person at
this time; he is at once in a position to lose her. An infant around 10 months may be seen
crawling behind his mother, from one room to another room. If mother is disappearing, he
may be cry and scream, and watch every door. Even his crying and searching at different
places is an indication of attachment with the mother. The increase in attachment behaviour is
considered to be an indication of separation anxiety.
iv) Fear of strangers: A second anxiety that is a direct result of the infant’s first attachment
is stranger anxiety. The child is specially attaching with the mother and he can be easily upset
by the approach of an unfamiliar adult, especially if his
mother is not present around. The infant fixes his eyes on the stranger and stares, unmoving,
for a short time. He is likely to cry and show the signs of distress. Stranger anxiety disappears
toward the end of the first year, as the child comes in contact with a growing number of
relatives.
v) Other primary and secondary emotions : Emotions are often divided into two general
categories: Basic emotions, such as interest, happiness, anger, fear, surprise, sadness and
disgust, which appear first, and self-conscious emotions, such as envy, pride, shame, guilt,
doubt, and embarrassment. Unlike primary emotions, secondary emotions appear as children
start to develop a self-concept, and require social instruction on when to feel such emotions.
The situations in which children learn self- conscious emotions varies from culture to culture.
Individualistic cultures teach us to feel pride in personal accomplishments, while in more
collective cultures children are taught to not call attention to themselves, unless you wish to
feel embarrassed for doing so (Akimoto & Sanbinmatsu, 1999).
Facial expressions of emotion are important regulators of social interaction. Young infants
have very limited capacity to adjust their emotional states and depend on their caregivers to
help soothe themselves. Caregivers can offer distractions to redirect the infant’s attention and
comfort to reduce the emotional distress. As areas of the infant’s prefrontal cortex continue to
develop, infants can tolerate more stimulation. By 4 to 6 months, babies can begin to shift
their attention away from upsetting stimuli (Rothbart et al, 2006). Older infants and toddlers
can more effectively communicate their need for help and can crawl or walk toward or away
from various situations (Cole, Armstrong, & Pemberton, 2010). This aids in their ability to
self-regulate. Temperament also plays a role in children’s ability to control their emotional
states, and individual differences have been noted in the emotional self-regulation of infants
and toddlers (Rothbart & Bates, 2006).
Development of sense of self: During the second year of life, children begin to recognize
themselves as they gain a sense of self as object. In a classic experiment by Lewis and Brooks
(1978) children 9 to 24 months of age were placed in front of a mirror after a spot of rouge
was placed on their nose as their mothers pretended to wipe something off the child’s face. If
the child reacted by touching his or her own nose rather that of the “baby” in the mirror, it
was taken to suggest that the child recognized the reflection as him- or herself. Lewis and
Brooks found that somewhere between 15 and 24 months most infants developed a sense of
self-awareness. Self-awareness is the realization that you are separate from others (Kopp,
2011). Once a child has achieved self-awareness, the child is moving toward understanding
social emotions such as guilt, shame or embarrassment, as well as, sympathy or empathy.
2.2.7. Cognitive Development in Infancy

Cognition is a broad and inclusive concept that refers to the mental activities involved
in the acquisition, processing, organisation, and use of knowledge. The major processes
under the term cognition include detecting, interpreting, classifying and remembering
information, evaluating ideas, inferring principles and deducting rules imagining
possibilities, generating, and strategies, fantasizing and dreaming. At the infancy period
children develop many elements of abilities to think and to understand the world around
them. Infants have remarkably competent organisms, even on the first day of life. The
newborn child is ready to the basic sensations of our species. They can see, hear, and smell,
and they are sensitive to pain, touch, and changes in bodily position.

Infants are not only growing physically during the first 2 years of life, but also they are
growing cognitively (mentally). Every day they interact with different persons and learn
about their environment and pathways between nerve cells both within their brains, and
between their brains and bodies. Cognitive change and development is a little harder to
determine as clearly. Therefore, much about what experts know about mental and cognitive
development is based on the careful observation of developmental theories, such as Piaget’s
theory of cognitive development and Erikson’s psychosocial stages. According to Piaget’s
theory, infants interact with their environment entirely through reflexive behaviours. They do
not think about what they are going to do, but rather follow their instincts and involuntary
reactions to get what they need, such as food, air, and attention.

Piaget believed that as children begin to grow and learn about their environment through their
senses, they begin to engage in intentional, goal-directed behaviours. Jean Piaget was the
most influential developmental psychologist of the twentieth century. The work of cognition
has held centre stage in child development research since 1960. His theory of cognitive
growth and change is original, comprehensive, integrative and elegant. He recorded infant’s
and children’s spontaneous activities, and presented problems of thousands of children and
adolescents. His ideas have been the source of many research studies. In Piaget’s theory,
knowledge is assumed to have a specific goal or purpose to aid the person in adapting to the
environment. The child does not receive information passively, and thoughts are not simply
the product of teaching by others. Nor is the cognitive progress seen as primarily a product of
maturation of a brain. Knowledge is acquired and thought processes become more complex
and efficient as a consequence of the maturing child’s interactions with the world. The
individual is active, curious and inventive throughout the life cycle.

The theory of cognitive development is a comprehensive theory about the nature and
development of human intelligence. It deals with the nature of knowledge itself and how
humans come gradually to acquire it, construct it, and use it. Moreover, Piaget claims that
cognitive development is at the centre of human organism and language is contingent on
cognitive development. Piaget considered cognitive development in terms of stages. He
mentioned four stages in cognitive development, that is i) Sensory motor stage (Birth -
2years) ii) Pre operational stage (2-7 years) iii) Concrete operational stage (7-11years) iv)
Formal operational stage (11-15 years).

The first stage is the sensory motor stage which lasts from birth to about two years old. The
infant uses his or her senses and motor abilities to understand the world, beginning with
reflexes and ending with complex combinations of sensory motor skills. This stage can be
divided into six separate sub-stages as given below: i) Reflexes (birth -1 month): The child
understands the environment purely through inborn reflexes such as sucking and looking. ii)
Primary Circular Reactions (1-4 months): Between one and four months, the child works
on an action of his own which serves as a stimulus to which it responds with the same action,
and around and around we go. iii) Secondary Circular Reactions (4-8 months): The child
becomes more focused on the world and begins to intentionally repeat an action in order to
trigger a response in the environment. iv) Coordination of Secondary Reactions (8-12
months): Develop certain focuses on the demand object. Responses become more
coordinated and complex. v) Tertiary Circular Reactions (12-24 months): Children begin a
period of trial and- error experimentation during this sub-stage. vi) Early Representational
Thought: Children begin to develop symbols to represent events or objects in the world in
the final sensory motor sub-stage.

2.2.8. Linguistic Development In Infancy

Language development is a process starting early in human life, when a person begins to
acquire language by learning it as it is spoken and by mimicry. Children’s language
development moves from simple to complex. Infants start without language. Yet by four
months of age, babies can read lips and discriminate speech sounds. The language that infants
speak is called babbling. Speech replaces gestures and babbling as the child starts
communicating his desires and ask questions during 6 months period. Speech, symbolism,
imitation of family members or others and morality are the most distinctive characteristics of
infants. After few months’ times the infant use their name and personal pronouns I, me, or
my. It represents the self-awareness and self-consciousness.

Usually, language starts off as recall of simple words without associated meaning, but as
children grow, words acquire meaning, with connections between words being formed. As a
person gets older, new meanings and new associations are created and vocabulary increases
as more words are learned.

Infants use their bodies, vocal cries and other preverbal vocalisations to communicate their
wants, needs and dispositions. Even though most children begin to vocalise and eventually
verbalize at various ages and at different rates, they learn their first language without
conscious instruction from parents or caretakers. In fact research has shown that the earliest
learning begins in utero when the foetus can recognise the sounds and speech patterns of his
mother’s voice.

Language is acquired with amazing rapidity, particularly after children speak their first
word, usually sometime around the end of the first year. This can be understood
during the months of 4-8 months child language characteristics is babbling such as,
‘baba’, ‘dada’ and ‘gaga’. At the age of 12 months, the infant first utters the
understandable words such as mommy, dog, dirty and yes. During 18 months the
language transforms into two word combination such as mommy milk, my pencil and
drink juice.
There are four main components of language development in children. Each component
has its own appropriate developmental periods.
i) Phonology involves the rules about the structure and sequence of speech sounds. From
shortly after birth to around one year, the baby starts to make speech sounds. At around two
months, the baby will engage in cooing, which mostly consists of vowel sounds. At around
four months, cooing turns into babbling
which is the repetitive combination of consonant and vowel. Babies understand more than
they are able to say. From 1–2 years, babies can recognise the correct pronunciation of
familiar words. Babies will also use phonological strategies to simplify word pronunciation.
Some strategies include repeating the first consonant-vowel in a multi syllable word (‘TV’—
> ‘didi’) or deleting unstressed syllables in a multi syllable word (‘banana’—>’nana’).
ii) Semantics consists of vocabulary and how concepts are expressed through words.
From birth to one year, comprehension (the language we understand) develops before
production (the language we use). There is about a 5 month lag in between the two. Babies
have an innate preference to listen to their mother’s voice. Babies can recognise familiar
words and use preverbal gestures. From 1–2 years, vocabulary grows to several hundred
words. There is a vocabulary spurt between 18–24 months, which includes fast mapping. Fast
mapping is the babies’ ability to learn a lot of new things quickly. The majority of the babies’
new vocabulary consists of object words (nouns) and action words (verbs). By 3–5 years,
children usually have difficulty using words correctly.

Children experience many problems such as under extensions, taking a general word and
applying it specifically (for example, ‘blankie’) and overextensions, taking a specific word
and applying it too generally (example, ‘car’ for ‘van’). However, children coin words to fill
in for words not yet learned (for example, someone is a cooker rather than a chef because a
child will not know what a chef is). Children can also understand metaphors.
iii) Grammar involves two parts. The first part is syntax, it refers to the rules in which
words are arranged into sentences. The second is morphology, it refers to the use of
grammatical markers (indicating tense, active or passive voice etc.). From 1–2 years, children
start using telegraphic speech, which are two word combinations iv) Pragmatics involves the
rules for appropriate and effective communication. The three skills involved in this include (i)
using language for greeting, demanding etc. (ii) changing language for talking differently
depending on who it is you are talking to (iii) following rules such as turn taking, staying
on topic, etc. From birth to one year, babies can engage in joint attention (sharing the
attention of something with someone else). Babies also can engage in turn taking activities.
By 1–2 years, they can engage in conversational turn taking and topic maintenance.