More Like this

1. The slow emergence of gaze‐ and point‐following: A longitudinal study of infants from 4 to 12 months

   https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.13457  

   Tang, Yueyan ; Gonzalez, Marybel Robledo ; Deák, Gedeon O. ( November 2023 , Developmental Science)

   Acquisition of visual attention‐following skills, notably gaze‐ and point‐following, contributes to infants' ability to share attention with caregivers, which in turn contributes to social learning and communication. However, the development of gaze‐ and point‐following in the first 18 months remains controversial, in part because of different testing protocols and standards. To address this, we longitudinally testedN = 43 low‐risk, North American middle‐class infants' tendency to follow gaze direction, pointing gestures, and gaze‐and‐point combinations. Infants were tested monthly from 4 to 12 months of age. To control motivational differences, infants were taught to expect contingent reward videos in the target locations. No‐cue trials were included to estimate spontaneous target fixation rates. A comparison sample (N = 23) was tested at 9 and 12 months to estimate practice effects. Results showed gradual increases in both gaze‐ and point‐following starting around 7 months, and modest month‐to‐month individual stability from 8 to 12 months. However, attention‐following did not exceed chance levels until after 6 months. Infants rarely followed cues to locations behind them, even at 12 months. Infants followed combined gaze‐and‐point cues more than gaze alone, and followed points at intermediate levels (not reliably different from the other cues). The comparison group's results showed that practice effects did not explain the age‐related increase in attention‐following. The results corroborate and extend previous findings that North American middle‐class infants' attention‐following in controlled laboratory settings increases slowly and incrementally between 6 and 12 months of age.

   A longitudinal experimental study documented the emergence and developmental trajectories of North American middle‐class infants' visual attention‐following skills, including gaze‐following, point‐following, and gaze‐and‐point‐following.

   A new paradigm controlled for factors including motivation, attentiveness, and visual‐search baserates. Motor development was ruled out as a predictor or limiter of the emergence of attention‐following.

   Infants did not follow attention reliably until after 6 months, and following increased slowly from 7 to 12 months.

   Infants' individual trajectories showed modest month‐to‐month stability from 8 to 12 months of age.

    

   more » « less
2. Responding to joint attention as a developmental catalyst: Longitudinal associations with language and social responsiveness

   https://doi.org/10.1111/infa.12515  

   Lasch, Carolyn ; Carlson, Stephanie M. ; Elison, Jed T. ( November 2022 , Infancy)

   Joint attention (JA), infants' ability to engage in triadic attention with another person and a separate object or event, emerges in infancy. Responding to joint attention (RJA) develops earlier than initiating joint attention (IJA) and may benefit from a reconceptualization from a competence to a skill that varies in performance. Investigating associations between RJA performance and important skills of toddlerhood such as language, social responsiveness, and executive function (EF) in typically developing samples can better elucidate how RJA may serve as a developmental precursor to later dimensional skills, with implications for both typical and atypical development. Here, 210 (82% White) infants completed the Dimensional Joint Attention Assessment (DJAA), a naturalistic play‐based assessment of RJA, at 8–15 months. At 16–38 months social responsiveness, verbal ability, and EF were assessed. Multilevel models showed that DJAA scores were associated with later verbal abilities and parent‐reported social responsiveness. Exploratory analyses showed trend‐level associations between RJA and EF. Results establish the content validity of the DJAA as a measure of RJA, and longitudinal associations with later verbal ability and social responsiveness. Future work should examine EF emergence and consolidation, and RJA and later EF associations.

    

   more » « less
3. The Role of Dyadic Coordination in Organizing Visual Attention in 5‐Month‐Old Infants

   https://doi.org/10.1111/infa.12255  

   Mason, Gina M. ; Kirkpatrick, Fiona ; Schwade, Jennifer A. ; Goldstein, Michael H. ( July 2018 , Infancy)

   In human infants, the ability to share attention with others is facilitated by increases in attentional selectivity and focus. Differences in early attention have been associated with socio‐cognitive outcomes including language, yet the social mechanisms of attention organization in early infancy have only recently been considered. Here, we examined how social coordination between 5‐month‐old infants and caregivers relate to differences in infant attention, including looking preferences, span, and reactivity to caregivers’ social cues. Using a naturalistic play paradigm, we found that 5‐month‐olds who received a high ratio ofsensitive(jointly focused) contingent responses showed strong preferences for objects with which their caregivers were manually engaged. In contrast, infants whose caregivers exhibited high ratios ofredirection(attempts to shift focus) showed no preferences for caregivers’ held objects. Such differences have implications for recent models of cognitive development, which rely on early looking preferences for adults’ manually engaged objects as a pathway toward joint attention and word learning. Further, sensitivity and redirectiveness predicted infant attention even in reaction to caregiver responses that werenon‐referential(neither sensitive nor redirective). In response to non‐referentials, infants of highly sensitive caregivers oriented less frequently than infants of highly redirective caregivers, who showed increased distractibility. Our results suggest that specific dyadic exchanges predict infant attention differences toward broader social cues, which may have consequences for social‐cognitive outcomes.

    

   more » « less
4. The real‐time effects of parent speech on infants' multimodal attention and dyadic coordination

   https://doi.org/10.1111/infa.12500  

   Schroer, Sara E. ; Yu, Chen ( September 2022 , Infancy)

   Parental responsiveness to infant behaviors is a strong predictor of infants' language and cognitive outcomes. The mechanisms underlying this effect, however, are relatively unknown. We examined the effects of parent speech on infants' visual attention, manual actions, hand‐eye coordination, and dyadic joint attention during parent‐infant free play. We report on two studies that used head‐mounted eye trackers in increasingly naturalistic laboratory environments. In Study 1, 12‐to‐24‐month‐old infants and their parents played on the floor of a seminaturalistic environment with 24 toys. In Study 2, a different sample of dyads played in a home‐like laboratory with 10 toys and no restrictions on their movement. In both studies, we present evidence that responsive parent speech extends the duration of infants' multimodal attention. This social “boost” of parent speech impacts multiple behaviors that have been linked to later outcomes—visual attention, manual actions, hand‐eye coordination, and joint attention. Further, the amount that parents talked during the interaction was negatively related to the effects of parent speech on infant attention. Together, these results provide evidence of a trade‐off between quantity of speech and its effects, suggesting multiple pathways through which parents impact infants' multimodal attention to shape the moment‐by‐moment dynamics of an interaction.

    

   more » « less
5. Hand preference trajectories as predictors of language outcomes above and beyond SES : Infant patterns explain more variance than toddler patterns at 5 years of age

   https://doi.org/10.1002/icd.2468  

   Contino, Kaityn ; Campbell, Julie M. ; Marcinowski, Emily C. ; Michel, George F. ; Ramos, Michelle L. ; Coxe, Stefany ; Hayes, Timothy ; Nelson, Eliza L. ( October 2023 , Infant and Child Development)

   Prior studies found that hand preference trajectories predict preschool language outcomes. However, this approach has been limited to examining bimanual manipulation in toddlers. It is not known whether hand preference during infancy for acquiring objects (i.e., reach‐to‐grasp) similarly predicts childhood language ability. The current study explored this motor‐language developmental cascade in 90 children. Hand preference for acquiring objects was assessed monthly from 6 to 14 months, and language skill was assessed at 5 years. Latent class growth analysis identified three infant hand preference classes: left, early right and late right. Infant hand preference classes predicted 5‐year language skills. Children in the left and early right classes, who were categorized as having a consistent hand preference, had higher expressive and receptive language scores relative to children in the inconsistent late right class. Consistent classes did not differ from each other on language outcomes. Infant hand preference patterns explained more variance for expressive and receptive language relative to previously reported toddler hand preference patterns, above and beyond socio‐economic status. Results suggest that hand preference, measured at different time points across development using a trajectory approach, is reliably linked to later language.

   Hand preference trajectories reliably predict preschool language above and beyond SES.

   Infants with a consistent hand preference for reaching had greater language skills at 5 years.

   Infant hand preference explained more variance in language than toddler hand preference.

    

   more » « less