How to Emotionally Stimulate Your Baby From Birth

It's important to emotionally stimulate your baby from birth, as this will be the beginning of learning how to manage their emotions in the future.

When they’re born, babies need us to take care of them, give them security, food, protection… but also our love and affection. We all know how important it is that we take care of our baby, not only physically, but also emotionally. Therefore, we’re going to see how we can emotionally stimulate the baby from birth.

Both the cognitive and emotional development of the baby evolve little by little, although this doesn’t mean that the child is born without the ability to feel emotions. Over time, we learn to identify, name, and manage these emotions.

Do you want to know how to stimulate your baby emotionally from birth? It’s important that we don’t forget to encourage our children’s emotional development.

How is a baby’s social and emotional development in the first months?

Babies, from their first months of life, already give signs of their social and emotional development. Let’s see how it evolves throughout these months.

From 0 to 3 months

Throughout these months, they begin to be more expressive, both with their faces and bodies; they’re already more communicative and parents enjoy those gestures that make them so special.

Closer to three months, they begin to imitate the smile they see in others and this smile becomes more and more social, as they use it as a form of communication. This differs from the first month of life when the smile is only a reflection to give way to the true social smile.

From 4 to 7 months

Babies begin to react to the emotions of others, especially with their primary caregivers. They enjoy play, especially with bright colors and sounds. In these early months, play is their way of learning.

Social and emotional aspects are present from birth and interrelated. We, as parents, are in charge of helping them learn and develop both.

Tips for emotionally stimulating your baby from birth

Given the importance of emotional and social development in people, it is essential that parents take care, from birth, to provide the necessary stimulation for the proper development of these skills. Let’s see how we can emotionally stimulate the baby from birth.

When the little one smiles, smile back

When they’re born, babies usually smile, especially when they sleep; this smile’s a reflex that will give way to social and voluntary smiles. From this moment on, they begin to show their emotions; with it, they indicate that they feel comfortable, happy, and secure.

At around 3 months, they begin to imitate smiles if they see them on other faces. This is their way of communicating with the person in front of them, so it’s important that we respond with a smile when a little one smiles at us.

This way, they’ll associate that our smile is a response to theirs and, in this way, the basis for further communication will be established.

Talk to them at all times

Although such a young baby won’t understand the meaning of our words when we talk to them because they haven’t yet begun to develop language, it’s important that we talk to them and respond to their babbling.

In addition, even if it seems that these babbles aren’t intentional, if we respond by talking to them, they’ll feel heard and this will develop their self-confidence and self-esteem.

To emotionally stimulate the baby from birth, respect their rhythms and tastes

Each child has their own rhythms and preferences, so we can’t impose how they should react or express their emotions. As your baby develops, you’ll become aware of how they like to be talked to, treated, or caressed…

As parents, we’re the ones who spend the most time with them, therefore, we’re the ones who know them best and can detect in their gestures and expressions how they feel or if they like or dislike anything.

Touching, looking, smiling

People, in addition to communicating through language, also communicate through gestures, behaviors, etc. In these first months of the baby’s life, our gestures become really important when it comes to communicating with our little ones.

We must take into account three basic aspects: Touching, looking, and smiling. With these three things, we’re giving our child security, attention, and love. Touch becomes a fundamental tool with babies, since we express our affection and love, and we teach him that, through these caresses, we share our emotions.

The importance of emotionally stimulating babies from birth

We’ve already seen how we can emotionally stimulate babies from birth. So, smile at your little ones when they smile because you’ll be offering them your company. Comfort them when they cry and they’ll feel protected, safe, and cared for. And caress them and touch them, because touch is the first communication we have at an early age with our babies.

Although it may be difficult to understand, education and emotional stimulation have to start from day one. Let’s show our love, care, and affection. With that, we’ll already be teaching them the value of respect.