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Visual exploratory behaviour in infancy and novelty seeking in adolescence: two developmentally specific phenotypes

Manfred Laucht1, Katja Becker, Martin H Schmidt

  • 1Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Central Institute of Mental Health, Mannheim, Germany. laucht@zi-mannheim.de

Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, and Allied Disciplines
|November 2, 2006
PubMed

Insights

Infant visual attention predicts adolescent novelty seeking in boys, particularly those with the dopamine D4 receptor (DRD4) 7r allele. This association was not observed in girls, suggesting sex-specific developmental pathways.

Area of Science:

  • Developmental Psychology
  • Behavioral Genetics
  • Neuroscience

Background:

  • Investigates the link between early visual exploration, adolescent novelty seeking, and the dopamine D4 receptor (DRD4) genotype.
  • Explores potential sex differences in these associations.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To examine the relationship between infant visual exploratory behavior and adolescent novelty seeking.
  • To determine the role of the dopamine D4 receptor (DRD4) genotype in this developmental trajectory.
  • To assess if these associations differ between males and females.

Main Methods:

  • Prospective longitudinal study of 232 infants (3 months old) using a habituation-dishabituation paradigm to measure visual attention.
  • Assessment of adolescent novelty seeking at 15 years using the Junior Temperament and Character Inventory (JTCI/12-18).
  • Genotyping for the DRD4 exon III polymorphism.

Main Results:

  • In boys, greater attention decrement in infancy correlated with higher novelty seeking at age 15.
  • Boys with the DRD4 7r allele showed both increased attention decrement in infancy and higher novelty seeking in adolescence.
  • No significant associations were found between DRD4 genotype, visual attention, and novelty seeking in girls.

Conclusions:

  • Provides evidence for the dopamine D4 receptor's involvement in novelty seeking across development.
  • Suggests a sex-specific role for DRD4 in the development of novelty-seeking behavior.
  • Highlights the predictive value of early visual attention for later behavioral traits.
Abstract

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