Psychological factors related to the development of the communication competences in the first year of life

Abstract

The first year of life is an essential phase for all psychological areas in the child development. The key competences, vital for all development processes of the child, focus on the communication and the socio-emotional competencies, mostly because the infant is strongly dependent of adult care environment. The quality of the primary caregiving relationship can configure the cognitive, affective and social development of the child in the first year of life. This study is aiming to identify the objective and psychological factors related to the development of early communication competences of the child in the first year of life and to identify the best predictors of these competencies, in order to conceptualize the best strategies to help the parents in their parental educational tasks and to prevent any delays in infant development. The study identifies a complex system of factors influencing the infant's communication skills, the prerequisites of communication being in relation both with the individual characteristics of the child in the first year of life, mainly the temperament and resilience, and with maternal and paternal factors, such as emotional maturity, patterns of primary attachment of the parents and the mother/father reflective functioning.

Keywords

• early communication competencies
• emotional competency
• self-regulating processes
• dyadic relationships