Describe and label emotions and facial expressions for your child. For example, when your baby is happy to see the food or sad when their toy is broken, express these feelings with your voice and facial expression.
Self-awareness develops in stages and in tandem with language use.
Self-awareness begins in infancy and develops in stages. The development of self-awareness in the early years is revealed in layered processes. These processes expand from body perception in action to the evaluative sense of self as perceived by others.
Young children develop a sense of self during interactions with others through moment-by-moment experiences of emotional communication. Babies learn about themselves as they learn about the feelings of others. Hence, increased opportunity to engage in cooperative social interaction and exposure to talk about mental states facilitates the development of social understanding.