ABSTRACT
It was early in the morning, and I was sitting near the fire enjoying a cup of coffee. I was on a camping trip with my brother and his family, and the morning was starting slowly. My brother and his family were still asleep, but the other couple that had joined us with their young twins was up and about. Mark, the father of the twins, had sat them both at a child’s table they had brought, and gave them each a bowl of cereal to eat. I was sitting at the fire 10 feet away, and the twins were enjoying their breakfast. Mark left to go into their camper, which was 20 to 30 feet away from where the twins were eating. All were content until Mary, the female of this mixed gender pair, lost her balance and fell backward onto the ground. Fortunately she was able to catch herself well enough that the fall was not serious, but it was still enough to startle her. She let out a cry of panic, as we might expect, and I ran over to assess the damage and help her back to her seat. Her parents were both in their camper and had not heard her cry out. When I arrived, she looked up at me from her face-up position on the ground, and I could see in her eyes that mine was not the face she had hoped to see. I asked if she was all right and helped her up. In an impressive display of maturity, young Mary quickly collected herself and, when helped onto her bench, proceeded to eat her breakfast with no display of distress. I knew that she had bumped her head very slightly, because she had put her hand to her head after the fall. I had looked at her head and could tell that things were fine; it really was not a serious fall, but certainly enough to startle an 18-month-old child. I pulled a few pieces of grass that had clung to her hair and asked again if she was all right. She gave me no response and simply returned to her breakfast. Believing that the crisis had been resolved, I returned to my chair, the early morning fire, and my cup of coffee. A few minutes later her father came out of their camper and walked over to where Mary and her brother sat. Let me remind you that for those couple of minutes since I had helped her back to her seat she had shown no distress and had continued eating. As her father approached and she became aware of his presence, she looked up at him, put her hand on her head, and began to cry—not vigorous crying, but certainly enough to elicit a father’s attention. Her father, being loving and attentive, knelt down and asked in a loving father’s voice, “What’s wrong sweetheart?” I watched (we psychologists are notorious for this) for a few seconds, noticing the concern on her father’s face and her continued display of distress. I explained what had happened, he checked her head and, seeing no serious injury, kissed her “booboo” and gave her a nurturing hug and very tender reassurance that everything was going to be okay. Hearing this, Mary returned to her breakfast with only the slight evidence of a crocodile tear on her cheek. I sat there is amazement. Was I not a psychologist I may have felt betrayed by her apparently ingenuine appreciation of my assistance. But as a psychologist interested in the adaptive nature of emotions, I was fascinated by the degree of emotional control exhibited by this toddler. She knew she had experienced a crisis of the type that required assistance. She expressed the mechanism she had mastered for eliciting assistance, and when the result was the Introduction of more threat (me), she quickly collected herself in order to prevent things from getting worse (she did not know me or what I presented—whether I was more threat or a source of comfort). She still knew something bad had happened, and when her father appeared, she expressed her concern in the only way she knew how, by crying.
