[Preterm neonates treated in intensive care units: development of interaction behavior in the first year of life]

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this research was to characterize the interaction during the first year of preterm infants whose weight was lower than 2000g and who had been in neonatal intensive care units for at least 10 days. METHOD: Fifty-three infants were observed during a year, twenty-one being boys and thirty-two girls. These infants were assessed regarding seventeen kinds of behavior which we considered important in person to person relationship, i.e., behavior which led to interaction or maintained it. In our analysis we considered the age at which the child was seen, sex, weight at birth, new born classification, time of hospitalization and neurological diagnosis.RESULTS: An analysis of the results showed that there was an evolution in the way preterm infants interacted although the progress was smaller than the one of their pair terms. The occurrence of communicative behavior was not affected by sex, weight at birth or newborn classification (adequate or small for gestational age). The postnatal time of hospitalization affected the occurrence of the behavior smiles to the reflected image in mirror. The infants diagnosed as being neurologically impaired showed a statistically significant smaller occurrence of behaviors: respond to smiles and speech by smiling, play peek-a-boo, protest at mothers departure, point to desired objects and carry out given orders. CONCLUSIONS: The infants diagnosed as having neurological disabilities showed a delay in more complex forms of interaction. The infants with more than 35 days of hospitalization showed alteration in the self-body construction, related to personality build up.