Synchrony in mother-infant interactions.

A measure of mother-infant synchrony was developed and used to compare the interactions of mothers with preterm and mothers with full-term infants. Each mother-infant dyad was observed during a standard bottle-feeding session on 3 separate occasions: once prior to hospital discharge and 1 and 3 months after discharge. Synchrony, defined by the correlation between mother and infant behavioral rates during corresponding segments of the observation session, was found to (1) distinguish between preterm and full-term groups at 3 months and (2) successfully predict below-average Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (HOME) scores at 9 months for dyads in which mother and infant behavioral rates were inversely related. Further analysis identified certain interaction characteristics related to synchromy.