Infant Behavior & Development最新文献

{"title":"A qualitative exploration of parents’ experiences of infant and toddler sleep and feeding during the United Kingdom COVID-19 lockdown(s)","authors":"Georgia Cook ,&nbsp;Anna Joyce ,&nbsp;Chris Robus ,&nbsp;Cristina Costantini","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102134","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102134","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>COVID-19 restrictions had a significant impact on family life, including daily activities and routines. This study aimed to explore the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on children’s sleep and feeding behaviours, through undertaking reflexive thematic analysis of parents' open-text box responses to survey questions related to their child’s sleep and feeding practices during COVID-19 restrictions. Six hundred and ninety one parents of children aged 0–24 months old who were living in the United Kingdom completed an online questionnaire between 14th December 2020 and 15th January 2021. Results suggested that the pandemic resulted in specific contemporaneous changes to feeding and sleep practices. Specifically, for feeding there were positives around an extension to breastfeeding but this was alongside a negative perception of increased breastfeeding demand. For sleep practices, parents reported primarily negative implications of poorer child sleep and an increase in reactive bedsharing. Overall there were some positive implications on general practices which impacted both sleep and feeding, including providing the opportunity for parents to make beneficial adjustments such as to their routines. However, there were also clear negative implications around practical challenges and a lack of formal and informal help and support. This is the first study to explore the impact of the pandemic and its associated restrictions (which offered a unique snapshot in time, unable to be experimentally replicated) on infant and toddler sleeping and feeding practices. Findings have implications beyond the pandemic as they provide an illustration of the ways in which parents, if afforded with favourable circumstances such as additional time, flexibility, a reduction in perceived pressure and social stigma may seek to change their child’s sleeping and feeding practices. In addition, specific child sleep and feeding behaviours which parents struggled with and may benefit from additional help and support in a post-pandemic context to contribute to children’s development and well-being are highlighted.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"81 ","pages":"Article 102134"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-09-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145008561","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"What have we learned about infant visual attention in the first 25 years of the 21st century?","authors":"Brianna K. Hunter ,&nbsp;Erim Kızıldere ,&nbsp;Shannon M. Klotz ,&nbsp;Christian M. Nelson ,&nbsp;Julie Markant ,&nbsp;Lisa M. Oakes","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102135","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102135","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the primary view of infant visual attention development focused on a transition across the first postnatal year from being stimulus-driven to goal-driven, reflecting a broader shift from subcortical to cortical control. This perspective was supported by decades of infant looking-time studies. However, our understanding of infant attention has significantly evolved over the past 25 years, shaped by both theoretical advancements and new technological and methodological tools. Researchers now understand that attention development reflects multiple interacting systems that have cascading effects across time. The availability of infant-suitable eye-tracking methods have allowed researchers to consider multiple aspects of attention by precisely measuring <em>when</em> and <em>where</em> infants look, emerging quantitative models of stimulus saliency and computational models of the visual system have deepened our understanding of bottom-up and top-down influences on infant attention, and new methods to evaluate infants’ egocentric views have allowed researchers to measure attention in naturalistic contexts. Thus, these innovations allowed us to address questions that were unthinkable 25 years ago. Here, we discuss how these advances have transformed our understanding of infant attention development and outline key directions for future research, paving the way for even more exciting discoveries in the next 25 years.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"81 ","pages":"Article 102135"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-09-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145008568","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Emerging neurodivergence in infancy and toddlerhood","authors":"Ming Wai Wan ,&nbsp;Shoba S. Meera ,&nbsp;Meghan R. Swanson","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102133","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102133","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"80 ","pages":"Article 102133"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144993930","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Bringing developmental assessment to the 21st century: The NIH Baby Toolbox","authors":"Courtney K. Blackwell","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102127","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102127","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"80 ","pages":"Article 102127"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144974593","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Composite scores for the NIH Baby Toolbox®.","authors":"Y Catherine Han, Elizabeth M Dworak, Maxwell Mansolf, Richard C Gershon, Aaron J Kaat","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102122","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102122","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The NIH Baby Toolbox® offers assessments spanning Cognition, Motor, and Social-Emotional Functioning domains and includes both measure-level and composite scores. Here, we describe the creation of eight composite scores, reflecting Language, Executive Function/Memory, Math, Cognition, Motor, Self-Regulation, Negative Affect, and Social Communication - key constructs in infant and toddler development. Using composite scores rather than measure-specific scores can offer a more holistic evaluation of functioning by combining measures, reducing the impact of outliers and measurement error. Using factor analysis, data from the original Baby Toolbox norming study (N = 2515 recruited; n = 2479 with at least one composite score; n = 2025 English, n = 454 Spanish) were analyzed to derive composite scores. Analyses were conducted on regression-weighted factor scores for individual measures to define composites. Psychometric properties were assessed using composite reliability, test-retest reliability, and external validation with the Ages and Stages Questionnaire (3rd edition), Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development (4th edition), and the child's age. Composite scores demonstrated excellent composite reliability, moderate to strong test-retest reliability, minimal practice effects for most scores, moderate and significant relations with most external measures, and moderate to strong correlations with age for abilities expected to improve with age. The Baby Toolbox composite scores offer a reliable, valid tool for assessing key areas of infant and toddler development. The evidence supporting their reliability and validity demonstrates their effectiveness as indicators of early cognitive, motor, and social-emotional growth, making them useful in clinical, research, and educational settings. This framework helps deepen our understanding and practical evaluation of developmental milestones during the early years.</p>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"80 ","pages":"102122"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12424376/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144812589","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Neurodevelopmental trajectories of face processing in infants: A review and future directions","authors":"Katherine Meltzoff,&nbsp;Cameron A. Ryczek","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102132","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102132","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Face perception is integral for social development in infancy, and for skills such as joint attention, recognition, and emotion processing. This review synthesizes research findings over the past 25 years related to ERP biomarkers of face perception in infants. We review this literature as it relates to face perception in neurotypical infants and those at risk for, or diagnosed with, autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Future research may be able to utilize these neural signatures of face processing as ‘biomarkers’ to predict which infants are most likely to develop ASD, which is important for early diagnosis and intervention. The N290, P400, and Nc have all been highlighted as ERP components which relate to face processing. We discuss how nuances in these three components respond to face versus non-face stimuli and to emotional facial expressions in neurotypical (NT) infants. Evidence suggests that infants at high risk for ASD and those who go on to develop ASD have measurable differences in brain activity in response to faces compared to those at low risk and who do not go on to have ASD. Although differences in brain activity while viewing faces may not be observed between infants at high risk for ASD and those without at a single time point, longitudinal studies, studies with more varied stimuli, and studies utilizing source localization have uncovered differences. Finally, we present a novel hypothesis about developmental trajectories in both neurotypical children and those with ASD related to both face and non-face processing.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"81 ","pages":"Article 102132"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-08-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144913513","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Investigating parental scaffolding and visual experiences in toddlers with autism and high familial likelihood for later autism diagnosis: A head-mounted eye-tracker study","authors":"Elizabeth Perkovich ,&nbsp;Sarah Mire ,&nbsp;Hanako Yoshida","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102130","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102130","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Parents of autistic children often exhibit distinct interaction styles—such as increased gesturing and sustained focus on their child’s face—compared to parents of neurotypical children, yet the mechanisms driving these behaviors remain unclear. This study examined how parental social scaffolding behaviors influence attention in toddlers at elevated likelihood of autism (i.e., younger siblings of autistic children) and their neurotypical peers. Thirty-eight toddlers (19 per group), matched on age and sex, participated in a semi-naturalistic parent-child play session while wearing head-mounted eye-trackers. Despite no group differences in toddlers’ sustained or joint attention (SA, JA), parents showed distinct interaction patterns: parents of elevated-likelihood toddlers focused more objects, while neurotypical-group parents engaged in more object naming and face-directed attention. Across groups, parental object-looking predicted toddler JA, and object-handling predicted SA. However, the link between object-handling and JA only emerged in neurotypical toddlers, suggesting group-specific differences in how parental cues are integrated. These findings suggest that toddlers at elevated likelihood for autism show comparable attentional behaviors but receive qualitatively different social input. Parents may adjust their scaffolding strategies in response to subtle developmental cues before formal diagnosis. This study highlights the importance of considering developmental context in early social scaffolding and contributes to understanding how parental input shapes attention in diverse populations.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"81 ","pages":"Article 102130"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-08-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144903546","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Broadening the lens: How 25 years of prospective longitudinal studies have reshaped infant neurodevelopment in the majority world","authors":"Laura Katus ,&nbsp;Sarah Lloyd-Fox","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102128","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102128","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Since the turn of the 21st century, advances in longitudinal research have underscored the critical importance of investing in early childhood development. Longitudinal neuroimaging, in particular, offers a powerful means of capturing within-person changes in infant brain development over time, rather than relying solely on age-based normative comparisons. Yet despite this progress, longitudinal infant neuroimaging studies, especially in Majority World contexts, remain the exception rather than the norm. As a result, opportunities to intervene during the first 1000 days, a crucial window for neurodevelopment, are often missed. Building on foundational work in Jamaica and Romania, recent studies in The Gambia, India, Brazil, South Africa and Bangladesh have begun to establish scalable, longitudinal metrics of neurodevelopmental change that can be implemented across diverse study sites. These approaches hold promise not only for integration into large, representative cohort studies, but potentially into standard healthcare practice, laying the groundwork for identifying infants who may benefit most from early intervention, particularly given that many neuroimaging biomarkers emerge before 12 months of age. There have also been promising advances in interventions targeting both psychosocial and biological sources of early adversity to improve neurodevelopmental outcomes for at-risk infants. Looking ahead, the full integration of neural markers into intervention studies across Majority World contexts will be essential to ensuring that all children, regardless of geography, have the opportunity to thrive.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"81 ","pages":"Article 102128"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-08-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144895837","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Learning to move, moving to learn: A quarter century of insights into infant motor development","authors":"Ravid-Roth Tal ,&nbsp;Kunde Wilfried ,&nbsp;Jaffe-Dax Sagi ,&nbsp;Eitam Baruch","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102131","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102131","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Over the past quarter century, the field of infant motor development has undergone a profound conceptual shift from viewing motor behavior as a biologically preprogrammed sequence to understanding it as a dynamic, emergent process shaped by interaction, feedback, and prediction. This review traces that evolution across three key eras: the rise of Dynamic Systems Theory (DST) in the 2000s, which emphasized real-time coordination across bodily and environmental systems, the developmental cascades framework of the 2010s, which demonstrated how early motor milestones shape broader developmental trajectories, and the emergence of predictive, mechanistic models in the 2020 s, inspired by advances in artificial intelligence and robotics. Building on this trajectory, we propose a unifying framework termed Reinforcement from Sensorimotor Predictability (RSP, which posits that infants repeat actions not because they are goal-directed, but because those actions produce consistent and expected feedback. We present preliminary findings from a gaze-contingent eye-tracking study, along with a large-scale longitudinal project that applies machine learning to track sensorimotor trajectories in early infancy. Together, these lines of work suggest that predictability itself may serve as an intrinsic reinforcer, thus laying the groundwork for learning, agency, and the emergence of intentional behavior.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"81 ","pages":"Article 102131"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-08-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144893650","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Home learning environment in Latin America and the Caribbean: Associations with young children’s cognitive and socioemotional development","authors":"Ana Clara Ventura ,&nbsp;Diana Leyva","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102126","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102126","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The home learning environment (HLE) plays a crucial role in children’s early development. Most research on the associations between the quantity and quality of the HLE and infant and toddler development has been conducted with North American and Western European samples. This is a synthesis of studies on HLE that examine associations with cognitive and socioemotional skills across the first 3 years of life in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). Studies reviewed were published between 2000 and 2025 and involved ethnically diverse samples. The article identifies key findings and discusses methodological and conceptual limitations in the studies. The article concludes by offering five recommendations and directions for research specifically in the LAC region: 1) emphasize more culturally relevant operationalizations; 2) investigate the interactive effects of the HLE components on young child development; 3) move beyond the frequency of home literacy activities; 4) incorporate the caregiver’s cognition and behavior measures; and 5) explore bidirectional associations between HLE and young children’s development. Expanding research efforts in this area beyond North America and Western Europe will contribute to a more inclusive, diverse, and globally representative infant developmental science.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"80 ","pages":"Article 102126"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-08-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144830220","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}