This article reports the behavior of 3 newborn chimpanzees in the first 4 months of life, reared by their mothers and living in a community of 14 chimpanzees in a semi-natural enriched environment. We focused on spontaneous activity during the night partly because sleeping behavior constitutes an essential part of the infants' activity.…

Time sampled observations of non-elicited behaviors, obtained for several hundred newborn babies were used to determine (1) whether specific motor patterns are state linked in the manner of spontaneous behaviors; (2) whether certain behaviors appear with greater frequency preprandially; and (3) whether associations between behaviors and states are…

This study examined changes in infants' performance in detecting tones as a funtion of time. Stimuli were presented in blocks of fixed frequency and intensity, rather than in random order. The findings of earlier studies that an observer can reliably tell from a 1-month-old's behavior when a pure tone is being presented, and that reinforcement of…

The behavior of 10 newborn babies given pacifiers in response to spontaneous empty sucking, rooting, and mouthing was compared to that of 10 controls. Observations, conducted at 24-hour intervals for four days, began 2 hours before and concluded 1 hour after feedings. (RH)

Two studies were conducted to examine (1) 1- to 3-day-old infants' imitation of their mothers, and (2) mothers' imitation of their newborn infants. For the infant imitation study, 30 mothers and their infants served as subjects. Two observers stood behind the mother to view the infant's face while the mother presented one of the following…

This study examined mother/child interactions during feedings for full-term, healthy premature, and sick premature newborns. Ten first-born infants in each of these categories were observed with their parents once in the hospital, twice at home, and once in the laboratory during the first 4 months of life. Observations focused on the position in…

Mothers' imitation of their infants during the first 3 days of life is examined in this study. Twenty-four newborn infants (12 males, 12 females) and their mothers participated in the study. On each of the first 3 days following delivery, mother-infant pairs were videotaped in a non-feeding interaction for approximately 5 minutes while the infants…

Findings from three studies that used a laboratory procedure to assess individual differences in various dimensions of infant temperament in relation to later Brazelton scores are presented. Participants included 59 healthy, full-term and sick, preterm infants. The sick, preterm infants included infants who developed respiratory or neurological…

This paper briefly reviews studies pertaining to the imitation of facial gestures in early infancy. It is suggested that imitation provides for the initiation of a reciprocal exchange between mother and infant, but does not sustain such an interaction, since this requires a continually varied and changing pattern of gestures. Thus there is an…

In this study, twenty 3-day-old Caucasian neonates were observed before and during feeding in an attempt to demonstrate that individual characteristics of infants, such as alertness and social behaviors, are related to the interaction of mothers and infants during feeding situations. Ten of the infants were males, 10 were females; approximately 70…