We compared the sensory and motor behaviors of typically developing infants with those of infant siblings of children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD), who are considered high risk for the disorder, to explore potential sensory and motor markers for use in early diagnosis of ASD. We compared frequencies of sensory and motor behaviors during 10-min, videotaped, infant-mother play sessions an...

The determinants of generalized imitation of manual gestures were investigated in 1- to 2-year-old infants. Eleven infants were first trained eight baseline matching relations; then, four novel gestures that the infants did not match in probe trials were selected as target behaviors. Next, in a generalized imitation test in which matching responses to baseline models were intermittently reinfor...

There are considerable differences among infants in the quality of interaction with their parents. These differences depend especially on the infants development which affects the parent behaviors. In our study we are interested on 3 groups of infants: typical development infants (TD), autistic infants (AD) and mental retardation infants (MR). In order to identify the groups of signs/behaviors ...

Early caregiver-infant interactions are critical for infants' socioemotional and cognitive development. Several hormones and neuromodulators, including oxytocin, affect these interactions. Exogenous oxytocin promotes social behaviors in several species, including human and nonhuman primates. Although exogenous oxytocin increases social function in adults--including expression recognition and af...

the effect of parents empowerment program on their beliefs about parental role, behaviors and characteristics of their premature infants in nicu    khajeh m [1] *, karimi r [2] , sadat hosseini as [3]     received: 14 apr , 2013 accepted: 20 jun , 2013  abstract  background & aims : about 10 percents of infants are born prematurely and their hospitalization is avoidable in many cases. this even...

Occupational therapists working with infants in neonatal intensive care units (NICUs) make positioning recommendations to optimize self-regulation, with little published data supporting this practice. In this retrospective descriptive study, 15 hospitalized preterm infants (M(gestational age) = 32 weeks) were videotaped during non-caregiving periods in order to record the frequency of specific ...

Seven-month-old infants appear to learn means-end skills, such as pushing a button to retrieve a distant toy (Psychological Review 104 (1997) 686). The present studies tested whether such apparent means-end behaviors are genuine, or simply the repetition of trained behaviors under conditions of greatest arousal, as suggested by a dynamic systems reinterpretation. When infants were trained to re...

: Maternal parenting behaviors during a mother–infant play interaction were examined in a sample of 160 low-income mothers and their 15-month-old infants. Maternal responsive/didactic, intrusive, and negative behaviors were coded from videotapes and examined in relation to mothers’ age, marital status, stressful life events, and depressive symptoms, and infants’ cognitive scores at 15 and 25 mo...