Mutual Joy and Social Development

In this chapter, I focus on the concept of mutual joy between caregivers and infants as a central feature of typical development that cuts across cultural boundaries and age groups. Mutual joy is the experience of shared positive emotions that infants and caregivers achieve together as the goal of the interaction. Mutual joy shapes the development of (1) infant self-understanding, (2) mental state understanding, (3) learning, and (4) communication. Mutual joy is the foundation from which the infant comes to develop a sense of agency, identity, and self-worth. Here, I argue that human development requires the early and continued experience of others showing positive emotional expressions as a result of shared social interaction.