While our experiences in the world can shape who we become as individuals, we are all born with a unique personality that guides our responses to those experiences throughout life. Infant temperament — not to be confused with infant temper, the speed at which an infant becomes angry — is a vital part of an infant’s personality. Temperament is characterized by an infant’s behavioral and emotional style of reactivity and self-regulation that they display in response to the world around them. Infant temperament is biologically based, present, and observable in an infant from birth.
Types of Infant Temperament
Although they are sometimes categorized differently, there are three basic types of infant temperament:
- Easy-Going – Easy-going infants tend to adjust easily to new environments and situations, have regular patterns, and are generally happy.
- Slow-to-Warm/Cautious – Slow-to-warm infants tend to be calm and highly observant. They usually need more time to adjust to new people, environments, and situations.
- Active/Difficult – Active infants tend to have more variability in their routines, but struggle to adapt to new people, routines, and environments. They usually have strong reactions to new stimuli and can be fussy.
Nine traits or characteristics influence infant temperament. These include:
- Activity (Energetic vs. Sedentary) – Amount of movement and energy level
- Regularity (Predictable vs. Variable) – Natural schedules and patterns of biological functions like sleep, feeding, and bowel movements
- Initial Reaction (Open vs. Hesitant) – Reaction to new situations, environments, and people
- Adaptability (Accommodating vs. Resistant) – Ability to adjust to changes
- Intensity (Exuberant vs. Lethargic) – Emotional response to the environment and events
- Mood (Positive vs. Negative) – Usual emotional state or outlook
- Distractibility (Attentive vs. Sidetracked) – Ability to focus
- Attention Span/Persistence (Immersed vs. Disinterested) – Ability to stick with an activity
- Sensory Threshold (Unaffected vs. Irritated) – Reaction to sensory stimuli like taste, aroma, touch, texture, brightness, or volume
Each of these traits comes together to create an infant’s basic temperament.
How Infant Temperament Affects Daily Life
Infant temperament influences the way an infant handles emotions, responds to their environment, and interacts with others, in addition to influencing their daily routine. As a result, temperament impacts a baby’s mood, their comfort with different people and environments, and their adaptability, and this can affect a family’s daily life. For example, an easy-going infant can readily adapt to changes, new people, and new environments, while a slow-to-warm infant will need time to feel safe and comfortable. Active infants tend to have more varied routines that can make it more difficult to plan ahead.
Parenting by Infant Temperament
In addition to impacting your daily life and routine, an infant’s temperament also impacts the approach to parenting that is most effective, and this is especially true when parents have different temperaments from their infants. For example, an easy-going parent will need to adapt their approach to parenting an active/difficult infant.
- Parents of emotionally reactive infants might experience more intense crying that requires the parent to adapt their approach to soothing and calming the infant.
- Parents of infants with high predictability will find their days flow best when they stick to their baby’s natural, rhythmic routine.
- Parents of a slow-to-warm baby will need to introduce new caregivers and environments gradually to their infants to help them feel secure.
- Active infants benefit from lots of outlets for movement and expression.
- Slow-to-warm infants benefit from calm and predictable environments.
Understand your infant’s innate temperament and adapt your parenting style accordingly.
Adapting Infant Parenting Strategies Over Time
As parents observe the traits and characteristics present in their infants, they can further adjust their parenting strategies to provide better support over time. Despite changing developmental needs, the temperament present during infancy tends to remain relatively steady throughout life.
Adjusting your approach to parenting is the best way for parents to support a child, regardless of temperament. For example:
- By helping a child with slow adaptability to prepare for change
- By providing lots of activities for a child with high activity levels
- By teaching and modeling healthy coping mechanisms for emotional regulation to a high-intensity child
- By creating a structured routine for a child with an irregular activity level
A parent’s job is to understand a child’s temperament and adjust their parenting style to encourage a child to learn, explore the world, develop social relationships, and participate in new activities by creating a safe, secure, and well-structured environment for them to do so.
Professional Infant Parenting Support and Guidance
At Children’s Wellness Center, our pediatricians understand that some infant temperaments can be more or less challenging for parents, especially depending on a parent’s own temperament and personality. If you are struggling to discern your infant’s temperament or identify effective ways to adapt your parenting style to each of your children, we can help. Our pediatricians are here to support you in every aspect of your parenting journey, from your child’s infancy throughout their development.
To learn more about parenting, we encourage you to sign up for our New Parents Class and to talk with a pediatrician about your concerns. Of course, if you have any questions or concerns about infant temperament, please contact us.
