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Volume 2 Number 1
Fall 2007
| Dialogue and
Co-Regulation: Using Dialogical Self Terminology in the
Relational-Historical Approach. A Commentary on Garvey & Fogel’s
“Dialogical Change Processes, Emotions, and the Early Emergence of Self” Dankert Vedeler Norwegian University of Science and Technology |
pp. 77-91 |
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| ABSTRACT. The
relational-historical approach to the study of mother-infant
interaction is discussed in the light of the theories of Henri Wallon
and Mikhail Bakhtin. The central question addresses the relevance of
the concept of dialogue for this area of research. It is argued that an
important common ground for Wallon and Bakhtin is the focus on the
bodily origin of social interaction. The infant initiates emotional
relationships through physical coregulation with persons and things.
Differences in the infant’s behaviour toward persons and things justify
a conceptualization of social coregulation as dialogue. The time
dimension is very important to understand the significance of
accumulated earlier experiences for the emergence of a dialogical self,
also, and in particular, in infants. That is the essence of the
relational-historical approach. In order to study development over
time, thus conceived, the ”frame” concept is central. However, in order
to be useful for observing development, the continuity of frames from
one observation session to another is as important as changes and
transitions. |
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| Keywords: Mother-infant interaction, infant intentionality, coregulation, dialogue, dialectics, frames | ||