ERIC Number: EJ1011126
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2013
Pages: 20
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1525-0008
EISSN: N/A
Increased Focus on the Mouth among Infants in the First Year of Life: A Longitudinal Eye-Tracking Study
Tenenbaum, Elena J.; Shah, Rajesh J.; Sobel, David M.; Malle, Bertram F.; Morgan, James L.
Infancy, v18 n4 p534-553 Jul-Aug 2013
This study examines face-scanning behaviors of infants at 6, 9, and 12 months as they watched videos of a woman describing an object in front of her. The videos were created to vary information in the mouth (speaking vs. smiling) and the eyes (gazing into the camera vs. cueing the infant with head turn or gaze direction to an object being described). Infants tended to divide their attention between the eyes and the mouth, looking less at the eyes with age and more at the mouth than the eyes at 9 and 12 months. Attention to the mouth was greater on speaking trials than on smiling trials at all three ages, and this difference increased between 6 and 9 months. Despite consistent results within subjects, there was considerable variation between subjects. This raises the question of whether a developmental "norm" of face scanning in infancy ought to be pursued. Rather, these data add to emerging evidence suggesting that individual differences in face scanning might reliably predict aspects of later development. (Contains 6 figures, 1 table, and 2 footnotes.)
Descriptors: Infants, Eye Movements, Longitudinal Studies, Age Differences, Infant Behavior, Attention, Child Development, Visual Stimuli
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A