Infant Behavior & Development最新文献

{"title":"Multiaxial evaluation of mother-child interaction in toddlers with feeding problems","authors":"Hatice Gülşen ,&nbsp;Koray Karabekiroğlu ,&nbsp;Elif Pekmezci Yazgı ,&nbsp;Miraç Barış Usta ,&nbsp;Tuğba Ayçiçek Dinçer","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2026.102179","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2026.102179","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Recent research emphasizes the critical role of parent-child interaction quality in the development and maintenance of feeding problems (FP). This study examined the relationship between mother-toddler interaction quality and FP in in toddlers aged 12–36 months, incorporating recent theoretical advances and intervention approaches. A cross-sectional comparative study was conducted with 58 mother-toddler dyads (33 with FP, 25 nonFP) recruited from pediatric and child psychiatry clinics. Mothers completed standardized assessments including Infancy Adaptive Eating Behavior Scale, Brief Infant-Toddler Social-Emotional Assessment, and Brief Symptom Inventory. Mother-toddler interactions during play and structured tasks were video-recorded and scored using the Mother-Toddler Interaction Multiaxial Assessment (MTI-MAXA). Toddlers with FP exhibited significantly more problematic eating behaviors and lower interaction quality compared to nonFP group. Mothers in the FP group had significantly lower total scores, particularly in Reciprocity and Flexibility-Adaptation. Toddlers in the FP group showed lower scores across most subscales, with overall dyadic interaction quality significantly poorer. Higher child involvement scores were associated with reduced odds of having FP, and greater maternal interaction quality predicted lower FP severity. No significant differences were found in maternal or child psychopathological risk between groups. The MTI-MAXA demonstrated excellent interrater reliability, with high internal consistency for both maternal (α =.933) and child (α =.946) interaction scores. These findings demonstrate that early relational difficulties contribute to FP independently of psychopathology. The study provides evidence for the effectiveness of observational assessment tools in identifying at-risk dyads and supports the implementation of family-centered, relationally-focused interventions. Early identification and targeted intervention focusing on interaction quality may prevent the escalation of subclinical difficulties into diagnosable feeding disorders.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"83 ","pages":"Article 102179"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146147355","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":"Corrigendum to \"Neurophysiology of sustained attention in early infancy: Investigating longitudinal relations with recognition memory outcomes\" [Infant Behavior and Development 70 (2023) 101807].","authors":"Annie Brandes-Aitken, Maya Metser, Stephen H Braren, Sarah C Vogel, Natalie H Brito","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2026.102194","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infbeh.2026.102194","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":" ","pages":"102194"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147718422","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":"The role of parental emotional factors in toddler’s amount of screen use","authors":"Caroline Foutry ,&nbsp;Claire Hofer ,&nbsp;Jenny S. Radesky ,&nbsp;Oana A. David ,&nbsp;Marie Danet","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2026.102178","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2026.102178","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In today’s world, children have high exposure to near-ubiquitous digital media in their homes. However, early use has been linked with developmental and emotional delays. In this context, the aim of our research was to examine specific emotional parental factors (i.e. anxiety-depressive and stress symptoms and parental reactions to children’s negative emotions) that may be associated with the amount of screen time toddlers have during weekdays and weekends. A total of 100 parents of toddlers aged 12–36 months participated in the study, completing questionnaires. The findings revealed that parents’ anxiety-depressive and stress symptoms were linked to their toddlers’ digital media use, particularly on weekends. Additionally, parents' reactions to their children's negative emotions were most strongly associated with weekend television usage. Overall, regardless of the type of screen or time of use, higher exposure to TV or mobile devices was associated with the greater likelihood of parents using screens as a response to their children’s negative emotions and a reduced likelihood of encouraging emotional expression. Moreover, associations between parental anxiety-depressive and stress symptoms and toddler weekday and weekend screen time were mediated by using screens to help children regulate emotions. This research enhances our understanding of the factors that may influence toddlers’ screen exposure. Targeted interventions addressing these factors could be developed to prevent or mitigate early and extensive screen use in young children.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 102178"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146020280","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":"Caregiver-infant behaviours during multi-component object play are associated with infant visual working memory","authors":"Sobanawartiny Wijeakumar,&nbsp;Christina Davidson,&nbsp;Aimee Theyer","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102164","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102164","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Through play interactions, caregivers play a significant role in shaping children’s early cognitive development. The over-arching objective of this cross-sectional study was to examine whether caregiver and infant behaviours in two types of play contexts that differed in the objects used, were associated with infant visual working memory. To address this, we collected video-recordings from 90 caregivers and 91 6-to-10-month-old infants while they engaged in a single object play (SO play) using single objects such as toy car, cup etc. and a multi-component object play (MO play) using organizational objects with multiple components such as stacking boxes, sorting towers etc. We coded caregiver intrusiveness, caregiver scaffolding, infant object engagement and infant distractibility during both contexts. Visual working memory was assessed at the same time in infants using a preferential looking task. Caregivers and infants showed more scaffolding and object engagement, respectively, during MO play compared to SO play. Further, caregiver intrusiveness, caregiver scaffolding and infant object engagement during SO play was positively associated with these respective behaviours during MO play. Finally, only behaviours during MO play were associated with infant visual working memory. Specifically, higher visual working memory was observed in infants who showed better object engagement and reduced distractibility and had caregivers who showed better scaffolding. These findings contribute to existing work on caregiver-infant dyadic interactions, by teasing apart differences in types of play contexts and examining the impacts on visual working memory in infants.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 102164"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145580371","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":"Better reflective functioning in mothers linked to longer joint attention with infants","authors":"Nursena Koç ,&nbsp;Hüseyin Ünlü ,&nbsp;Berna A. Uzundağ","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102166","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102166","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Joint attention is a foundational precursor to later developmental outcomes such as vocabulary, intelligence, and theory of mind. Previous research has shown that maternal sensitivity, depressive symptoms, and parent-child attachment security are associated with attention-sharing behaviors between mothers and their infants. The present study examined the relationship between mothers’ reflective functioning (the ability to recognize and interpret one’s own and one’s child’s mental states, as well as the behaviors motivated by those mental states) and joint attention. Data were collected from 72 infants aged 10–16 months and their mothers. Results indicated that mothers who reported greater difficulty in understanding and distinguishing between their own and their child's mental states (i.e., higher prementalization) tended to engage in joint attention episodes that were shorter and more frequent, and they were also more likely to terminate these interactions. In contrast, mothers expressing greater interest and curiosity about their infants’ mental states spent longer periods in joint attention, initiated these episodes less often, and were less inclined to terminate them. Additionally, mothers who felt more certain about their infants’ mental states were less likely to end joint attention episodes. After controlling for infant age and socioeconomic status, higher levels of interest and certainty continued to predict lower maternal termination, while prementalization was still linked to a higher number of joint attention episodes. These findings suggest that mothers’ perceptions of their infants’ mental states shape how they engage in shared attention during everyday play interactions.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 102166"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145624267","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":"Different patterns of association between maternal mental health and infant negative affect subdomains: Findings from the Germina cohort","authors":"Erick Medeiros ,&nbsp;Pedro Tótolo ,&nbsp;Pedro Zuccolo ,&nbsp;André Fujita ,&nbsp;Luisa Sugaya ,&nbsp;Tatiane Borja ,&nbsp;Helena Brentani ,&nbsp;Guilherme Vanoni Polanczyk ,&nbsp;Daniel Fatori","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102174","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102174","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Negative affect (NA) is a central dimension of infant temperament and an early marker of risk for later psychopathology. While maternal mental health has been associated with increased infant NA, few studies have explored how maternal mental health symptoms relate to the specific subdomains of NA throughout infancy. This study examined longitudinal associations between maternal mental health and infant NA, comparing the general domain with its specific subdomains. We analyzed data from 557 mother–infant dyads enrolled in the Germina cohort in São Paulo, Brazil. Maternal symptoms of depression, anxiety, and stress, along with infant NA and its subdomains—sadness, fear, distress to limitations, and falling reactivity—were assessed at 3, 5–9, and 10–16 months postpartum. Longitudinal associations were examined using linear mixed-effects models with successive-differences contrasts, adjusting for sociodemographic covariates. Maternal stress consistently predicted higher NA and its subdomains—sadness, fear, and distress—across infancy, and was linked to reduced falling reactivity. Depression was associated with increased NA, distress, and decreased reactivity throughout infancy. Anxiety exhibited a time-varying association with distress, increasing from 3 to 9 months before declining, but showed no link with overall NA. Subdomain-specific analyses uncovered maternal mental health associations not evident in general NA models. Examining NA subdomains provides a more detailed understanding of their evolving, dynamic relationships with maternal mental health across infancy. These insights highlight the importance of integrating NA subdomains into screening and intervention strategies to more effectively support at-risk children.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 102174"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145795270","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":"Applying a Transformer-based machine-learning model to classify caregiver and infant behaviours during dyadic interactions","authors":"Alexander Turner ,&nbsp;Aly Magassouba ,&nbsp;Sobanawartiny Wijeakumar","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102175","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102175","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Multimodal caregiver-infant interactions have both concurrent and long-term impacts on child attention, cognitive and social skills. These behaviours are typically manually coded by human researchers, making this approach susceptible to observer bias, dependent on inter-rater reliability, and substantial demands on time and resources. In this study, we aimed to develop a multimodal machine-learning model that could be capable of automatically detecting and classifying multimodal behaviours from video recordings of caregivers and their infants (N = 81; infant mean age = 251.3 ± 34.9 days) engaging with objects. We focused on caregiver scaffolding, caregiver intrusiveness, infant object engagement and infant distractibility. Low-level features from audio, video, and pose data were extracted using specific AI models, and input into a Transformer-based architecture capable of learning temporal patterns across modalities. Our findings revealed a significant contrast in model performance depending on how the data was partitioned. Following previous research, when the dataset was split such that data from all dyads contributed to the training, validation, and test sets - the models achieved notably high classification accuracy of over 98 %. However, when tested on entirely unseen dyads, the performance dropped markedly to around 55 %. These results suggest that the models did not learn behaviors of interest but instead relied on video-specific or dyad-specific details - underscoring key generalizability challenges in applying Transformer-based models to complex, multimodal behavioral data. Nonetheless, this work lays a foundation for future research aimed at refining these models and extending their applicability across diverse caregiving contexts.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 102175"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145776068","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":"Sequential communication patterns reflecting building blocks of conversation: Associations with toddler temperament and mother and father sensitivity","authors":"Margaret A. Fields-Olivieri,&nbsp;Kristin J. Jennings,&nbsp;Crystal E. Thinzar,&nbsp;Brianna M. Halter","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102177","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102177","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Although parent-child conversation is a well-established predictor of subsequent language development, the field lacks understanding of how these conversations emerge and are sustained in everyday life, and of non-sociodemographic factors that account for variability in everyday parent-child conversations. In a sample of 24 one-year-olds (Mean Age = 16.47 months; 95.8 % White, 4.2 % Biracial) and their parents who completed daylong audio recordings, we identified three communication sequences reflecting crucial building blocks of parent-toddler conversation: 1) parental responses to toddler verbal/pre-verbal vocalizations, 2) the effect of parental responses on the toddler’s subsequent communicative behavior (i.e., whether the toddler vocalized again) and 3) parental initiation of conversations. We examined factors accounting for variability in these sequences, including toddler temperament (effortful control and negative affectivity), parental sensitivity, and the interaction between toddler temperament and parental sensitivity. Higher toddler effortful control predicted marginally greater likelihood of maternal responses to toddler vocalizations, marginally greater likelihood that toddlers vocalized following maternal responses, and significantly greater likelihood that fathers initiated conversation with their toddlers. The effects of toddler negative affectivity were largely moderated by parental sensitivity, with higher negative affectivity generally being negatively associated with sequential patterns of parent-toddler conversation engagement, but with higher mother or father sensitivity buffering against or compensating for some of these disruptions. The results highlight the need to disentangle different aspects of parent-toddler conversation to understand factors that account for individual differences in conversation engagement in naturalistic settings.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 102177"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145866076","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":"Parent Well-Being and Language Input Predict Child Face-Voice Matching and Expressive Language Outcomes","authors":"Elizabeth V. Edgar ,&nbsp;Kaitlyn Testa ,&nbsp;Bethany Ramirez ,&nbsp;Ryan A. Cannistraci ,&nbsp;James Torrence Todd ,&nbsp;Lorraine E. Bahrick","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102163","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102163","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Parent well-being and quality of language input are well-established predictors of child language. Recently, child intersensory processing of faces and voices was found to predict child language. However, relations between child skills (e.g., intersensory processing) and parent factors (e.g., well-being, language input) remain unclear. This study assessed relations among parent well-being, quality of language input, child intersensory processing, and language in 97 children (51% female; 70% White, 65% Hispanic; 52% mothers with Bachelor’s degree or higher) at 36 months. Greater well-being and quality of language input predicted greater intersensory face-voice matching, which predicted greater expressive (not receptive) vocabulary size at 36 months. This study demonstrates the importance of contributions of parent behaviors to child intersensory face-voice matching skills, and in turn, language.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 102163"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145624268","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":"The Italian MB-CDI ‘Words and Gestures’ complete and short form: Normative data and validity","authors":"Pasquale Rinaldi ,&nbsp;Arianna Bello ,&nbsp;Silvia Stefanini ,&nbsp;Maria Cristina Caselli ,&nbsp;Patrizio Pasqualetti","doi":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102173","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102173","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study compares normative data of the Italian Words and Gestures complete form (WG CF) and short form (WG SF) of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories (MB-CDI). The samples included 648 children for the WG CF and 583 children for the WG-SF designed for children aged 8–24 months. The concordance between WG SF and WG CF is analyzed in a subgroup of 66 children. Results revealed very close developmental trends as assessed through the two forms, and strong correlations between action/gesture production, word comprehension and word production. The two forms showed high concurrent validity with Intra-Class-Correlation coefficients higher than 0.70, suggesting that the two forms may be used interchangeably in order to describe early communicative and linguistic development in children up to 24 months of age, paying particular attention of saturation of the short form in assessing action-gesture production.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48222,"journal":{"name":"Infant Behavior & Development","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 102173"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145745245","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}