ABSTRACT
DURING social interaction, participants’ current behaviors are largely influenced by preceding levels of their own and their partners’ behaviors (Cappella & Planalp, 1981; Hewes, 1979; Thomas & Martin, 1976). Conversational remarks are linked to previous utterances (Planalp & Tracy, 1980; Tracy, 1982), intimacy levels of utter- ances frequently approximate intimacy levels of past remarks (Davis, 1976; 1977), vocal and other nonverbal behaviors are adjusted in response to pre- vious levels of like behaviors (Giles & Powesland, 1975; Cappella, 1981, 1982; Cappella & Greene, 1982), and so forth. Recently, a growing body of research has demonstrated that the interactions of infants with their caregivers are also characterized by identifiable patterns of reciprocal and mutually influential behavior (see, for example, Cappella, 1981; Lewis & Rosenblum, 1974; Schaffer, 1977).
