Presented paired-comparison familiarization-novelty recognition task to 4-month-olds. Found that peak look duration during pretest and familiarization periods predicted recognition performance. Recognition was unaffected by choice-trial length. Longer gaze durations during pretest and familiarization were associated with more time in heart…

Patterns of relationships were explored among developmental age, teacher ratings of global engagement, and observed engagement for 9.5- to 63.6-month-olds. Analysis revealed two uncorrelated patterns of relationships: (1) a positive relationship between developmental age and high levels of engagement and a negative relationship with lower…

Investigated 4-month-olds' responsiveness to others' affective expressions in the context of a peekaboo game. Found differential patterns of visual attention and affective responsiveness to happiness/surprise, anger, fear, and sadness. Findings underscore importance of contextual information for facilitating recognition of emotion expressions and…

Clarifies issues involved in use of heart rate as index of newborn attentional responsivity by reviewing related studies and concluding that heart rate variability can be used in studying attentional responsivity state, and intra-individual and individual variables. (ED)

A total of 48 8- to 14-week-old infants were presented with a non-contingently moving visual stimulus and the infants' visual attention was measured. Infants who exhibited decrements in attention to the non-contingent stimulus showed recovery in attention when the same stimulus was made to move contingent upon a motor response. Moreover, wisual…

Infants at two, four, and six months of age learned a string-pulling task and were tested again two months later. Individual differences in emotional expressions of anger during extinction, and interest and enjoyment during learning, were stable over the two-month interval. (BC)

Evaluated respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) and heart period in 5-month-olds during interaction challenges. Found that during object-mediated challenge, RSA increases were uniquely related to positive engagement. During person-mediated challenge, subjects showed more complex integration of autonomic and behavioral responses such that only infants…

Studies on peer interaction in infancy seem to imply that social group structure emerges from infants' and toddlers' dyadic interactions. In contrast to this position, the present study hypothesizes that attention structure may be a major precursor for social group structure. To investigate that possibility, an attempt was made to develop a…

In an attempt to address the issue of bimodal coordination of featural stimuli, the sensitivity of 3-month-old infants to the auditory and visual components of male and female stimulus configurations was examined. Measures were made of the infants' visual attention to a male or female face while they listened to a male voice, female voice, or to…

This study investigated the effects of prior experience with contingent or noncontingent stimulation of infants' ability to learn different responses to control perceptual stimulation. In the pretest phase, baseline rates of level movement, panel press and vocal responding were determined for each of the twelve, 6-month-old infants in the study.…

Gaze patterns of retarded and nonretarded infants (N=16) during play and instruction with their mothers were compared at two developmental ages (5-10 and 11-16 months). Regardless of group, situation, or age, infants were overwhelmingly oriented toward the toys. Configurations of looking patterns were more consistent across ages among the…

Examines differences in habituation in a visual attention task as a function of chronological age, mental age, and handicapping condition. Subjects were 102 children who ranged in age from 3 to 36 months and who were classified as Down Syndrome, cerebral palsied, developmentally delayed, or multiply handicapped. (Author/RH)

Proposes to identify the mechanisms underlying the links between maternal attention directing strategies and infants' focused attention. Observes onset and offset of maternal behaviors toward objects and infants' attention in a sample of 50 dyads during the first year of life. Discusses research methods, results, and implications for further…

Examined visual fixation in infants 6 months to 2 years old for fit with theory of attentional inertia. Found that fixations had lognormal distribution, heart rate decreased during a look, and heart rate returned to prestimulus levels immediately before look offset. Older children showed different looking patterns to two types of stimuli; younger…