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. 2020 Sep 16;7(9):201178.
doi: 10.1098/rsos.201178. eCollection 2020 Sep.

Social and emotional contexts predict the development of gaze following in early infancy

Kim Astor  1 , Marcus Lindskog  1 , Linda Forssman  1 , Ben Kenward  2 , Mari Fransson  1 , Alkistis Skalkidou  3 , Anne Tharner  4 , Juliëtte Cassé  5 , Gustaf Gredebäck  1
Affiliations

Social and emotional contexts predict the development of gaze following in early infancy

Kim Astor et al. R Soc Open Sci. .

Abstract

The development of gaze following begins in early infancy and its developmental foundation has been under heavy debate. Using a longitudinal design (N = 118), we demonstrate that attachment quality predicts individual differences in the onset of gaze following, at six months of age, and that maternal postpartum depression predicts later gaze following, at 10 months. In addition, we report longitudinal stability in gaze following from 6 to 10 months. A full path model (using attachment, maternal depression and gaze following at six months) accounted for 21% of variance in gaze following at 10 months. These results suggest an experience-dependent development of gaze following, driven by the infant's own motivation to interact and engage with others (the social-first perspective).

Keywords: attachment; gaze following; infant; longitudinal; maternal postpartum depression; social context.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the study was conducted in the absence of any conflicting interests.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
One of the three actors who contributed to the stimuli in the gaze following task. First, the actor looked down (left image), then raised her head to look at the infant (middle image) before she turned her head to look at either one of the two objects, left or right (right image). The three black squares within this image represent the AOIs. The black arrow in the background indicates the general time flow of the trial.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Illustration of the path model, structured as we conceptualize our measures to be related. Solid black arrows represent significant paths. Grey thin arrows are non-significant paths. The numbers accompanying each arrow are the standardized path coefficient (left) and its associated p-value (right). The wide light grey arrows in the background suggest a timeline, separating the different longitudinal measures.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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