母親の乳児の泣き声の知覚に関する研究

抄録

This paper presents a set of data describing maternal perception of infant cries. One hundred females served as subjects. They formed the following five groups: (A) 20 mothers not currently pregnant; (B) 20pregnant mothers: (C) 20 nulliparous pregnant women without any professional experience with infants; (D) 20unmarried women with professional experience with infants, and (E) 20unmarried women without any professional experience with infants. The Semantic Differential technique was used to examine perceptual sensitivity to cries of healthy infants with a different amount of complications in their obstetric histories. The results showed that Group C could discriminate between cries of the low-and high-complication infants as well as Groups A and B, all three groups discriminating better than Groups D and E. These results were interpreted as an evidence that the ability to recognize the meanings of infant cries would come to exist among nulliparous women in their pregnant period.