It seems to me that the contemporary work on parental responses to infants' crying has moved away from learning and attachment theories and toward a regulation framework. This theoretical approach takes into account some of the individual differences in the infants' and parents' behaviors and emotion regulation and away from a "one size fits all" approach. The abstract I included below (Jahromi and Stifter, 2007) might provide a good starting point for some of the research that takes this approach. Unfortunately I am working from home and don't have access to the full article.
Dennis Jahromi, L. B. & Stifter, C. A. (2007). Individual differences in the contribution of maternal soothing to infant distress reduction. Infancy, Vol 11(3), 255-269. This study investigates individual differences in the contribution of specific maternal regulatory behaviors to the mother-infant dyad's regulation of infant distress response. Additionally, we examined the stability of infants' stress responses and the stability of specific maternal soothing behaviors. The sample included 128 mother-infant dyads that were observed during an inoculation at 2 and 6 months. The average intensity of infant cry response showed modest stability across age only before controlling for the infant's general state of irritability, and the duration of crying was not stable. Of the 8 specific maternal regulatory behaviors studied, affection, touching, and vocalizing showed the strongest stability across infant age. Finally, an index of the contingency between maternal soothing and infant cry reduction at 2 months predicted shorter cry duration but not cry intensity at 6 months. The results of this study indicate that infants whose mothers showed a greater contribution to reducing their distress at 2 months showed a shorter duration of crying 4 months later. This suggests a possible longitudinal influence of maternal regulation on infants' distress responses. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2007 APA, all rights reserved)(from the journal abstract) --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
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