Commenting on your baby’s feelings – helping your baby to recognise their emotions

What to try 

• Make comments about how your baby might be feeling as you go about your day.  
• For example, if they cry when a visitor leaves you could comment, “Oh, you are feeling sad because Grandma had to go. Let’s wave to Grandma then go and have a cuddle and a story.”  
• Your baby might not understand all the words you say, but naming their feelings in this way will help them to begin to recognise how they feel.  

Good to know 

Saying how you think your baby is feeling is known as making ‘mind-minded comments’.  

Mind-minded comments are comments about another person’s thoughts or feelings. This could be a comment about how you think your baby feels, or comments about a toy or another person's thoughts and emotions.   

In the future, this recognition of their emotions will help your baby to understand and empathise with other people. This will take time and lots of experience, but being sensitive to, accurately recognising and naming your baby’s emotions will support them to develop these skills.