To be fair, Edward Tronick, the creator of the still face experiment, didn’t conclude that parents need to bathe their kids in unending attention.

Found in various corners of YouTube, videos of this 40-year-old test are as relevant than ever, showing us just how important it is to pay attention to our children. But it does pretty effectively drive the idea home. You don’t need the still face experiment to understand that. Parental attention is crucially important to the healthy development of babies and young children.

Baby forgets all and gets back to playtime as if nothing happened. On a second prompt, dad turns away again, and when he looks at baby again he’s his normal self, soothing the baby, who quickly recovers. Within a few minutes, the child dissolves, crying, squirming, and desperately trying to make a connection. Baby tries to get dad to smile again, but he keeps up the flat affect, remaining neutral and unresponsive. When he turns back, his face is completely expressionless. Then, prompted by the researcher, the dad turns his face away from the stroller. At first, a parent and baby play together, dad smiling and cooing, baby clapping her hands and laughing.

Flat face affect