Videotaped play segments between 15 4-month-old infants with their adolescent mothers and then with their fathers. Findings indicated that fathers' type of play was very similar to mothers' with the exception that fathers engaged in more social play. Fathers were found to be less sensitive than mothers to their infants' communications and fathers…

Investigates infant stimulation as it relates to nurturing and natural mothering activities. A format for a case-study of a newborn infant and her parents is discussed. (RJC)

Study based on Child Health Supplement to 1981 National Health Interview Survey showed higher prevalence of medicated respiratory illness among children under age five when they were cared for outside the home. For children under age three, prevalence was highest in child care centers, lower in other homes, and lowest in own home. (Author/NB)

Examines the influence of hormonal factors during pregnancy on maternal responsiveness in infrahuman animals and human beings. Argues that it is likely that maternal behavior in humans has a physiological basis. (PCB)

Concludes that constant errors of several degrees of visual angle may result if group-mean parameter values are used instead of individually determined parameter values. Because infants are relatively inaccurate in directing fixations toward a selected target, repeated calibration trials are required for collection of sufficient data on individual…

In 5 experiments, 10 month olds were habituated to exemplars of a form category and tested for categorization in paired-comparison trials involving in-category versus out-of-category stimuli. Results suggest infants' internal representation for category will not include stimulus dimension not varied in exemplars from which the category was…

Content analysis was used to assess the extent to which psychological theories and research about infants were communicated to parents from 1955 to 1984 in two popular publications, the "Infant Care Manual" and "Parents" magazine. Findings indicated that there was no singular relation between what experts knew and what was…

Preferences for moving versus static bars were assessed in 8-, 16-, and 20-week-old infants. Findings revealed that at both 16 and 20 weeks, preferences were affected only by the velocity of the bar's movement. This effect persisted at 20 weeks even when static reference features were added to the display. (RH)

Investigates the relationship between self-recognition and self-evaluative emotions in two studies on 27 children aged 9-24 months and 44 children aged 22 months. The results of both studies indicate that embarrassment but not wariness was related to self-recognition. (RJC)

Study of how the verbal component of "babytalk" affected three-month-olds' (N=40) vocal qualities suggested that conversational turn-taking facilitated a speak-listen pattern of infant vocalizations and indicated that what adults "say" to infants influences what infants "say" in response. (Author/CB)

Investigation into the relative effectiveness of four input strategies for two-year-olds' (N=56) category evolution found that the most effective strategy involved labelling an object and providing both a physical demonstration and a verbal description of important attributes. (Author/CB)

Examined effects of social objects on smile production in 44 infants aged 1 1/2 years. Infants directed most of the smiles produced during nonsocial activity to an attentive social object. Although smiling frequency was lower when the only potential recipient was inattentive, the effect did not appear to be mediated by negative emotion. (RJC)

Results indicated that in both adults and infants combined cues facilitate discrimination of the phonemic contrast regardless of whether the cues cooperate or conflict. The three experiments did not support a phonetic interpretation of conflicting/cooperating cues for the perception of final stop consonant voicing. (Author/DB)

Investigated 314 young children who had neonatal hyperbilirubinaemia. Results indicated that these children managed less well in neurological and psychological tests, had poorer school marks, and more often attended special classes than did members of the control group. (RJC)

Two studies found infants' scores on the Range of State Cluster of the Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale with Kansas Supplements to correlate significantly with visual discrimination performance at three months of age. The correlation with behavioral state organization contradicted the prediction that orientation scores would predict visual…