Infants' timing strategies to optical collisions: a longitudinal study.

Full Abstract

Blinking is a good indication of awareness to optical collisions in early infancy. In the current longitudinal study, infants were presented with the image of a looming virtual object approaching on a collision course under different constant velocities and constant accelerations. The aim was to investigate which timing strategies the infants used to determine when to make the defensive blink. Blinking when the virtual object reaches a threshold visual angle (angle-strategy) or angular velocity would result in difficulties with accelerating approaches, while blinking when the object is a certain time away (time-strategy) would enable successful responses to all approaches. Eleven infants were tested longitudinally at 22, 26, and 30 weeks. Five infants switched from an angle- to a time-strategy, while one infant switched from using angular velocity to a time-strategy. Five infants used a time-strategy already at 22 weeks. These findings show that with age there is an attunement in the perceptual systems of infants which makes them switch to better specifying variables, enabling them to successfully time their defensive blinking to impending optical collisions.

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Author information

Author/s: Kayed, Nanna Sønnichsen (NS); van der Meer, Audrey L H (AL);

Affiliation: Developmental Neuroscience Laboratory, Department of Psychology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, 7491 Trondheim, Norway. Nanna.Kayed(-atsign-)svt.ntnu.no

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

Journal: Infant behavior & development (Infant Behav Dev), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2007-Feb; vol 30 (issue 1) : pp 50-9

Dates: Created 2007/02/12; Completed 2007/02/22; Revised 2008/03/28;

PMID: 17292779, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 12/26/2008)

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

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MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MESH Headings shown below.

Blinking - physiology
Child Development - physiology
Distance Perception
Female
Humans
Infant
Longitudinal Studies
Male

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