Related Experiment Video
Updated: Apr 25, 2026
Exploring Infant Sensitivity to Visual Language using Eye Tracking and the Preferential Looking Paradigm
Published on: May 15, 2019
Gaze following is accelerated in healthy preterm infants
Marcela Peña1, Diana Arias2, Ghislaine Dehaene-Lambertz3
1Laboratorio de Neurociencias Cognitivas, Escuela de Psicología, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile mpenag@uc.cl marcella.pena.g@gmail.com.
Insights
Preterm infants develop gaze following skills comparable to full-term infants at the same chronological age. Early visual experience, not brain maturity, appears key for this crucial communication cue development.
Area of Science:
- Developmental psychology
- Cognitive neuroscience
- Infant communication
Background:
- Gaze following is a critical early communication skill, typically developing by 7 months in full-term infants.
- Preterm infants have immature brains but may have earlier visual exposure to social interactions.
- Understanding factors influencing gaze following development in preterm infants is important for assessing developmental trajectories.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate whether preterm infants acquire gaze following abilities earlier than typically expected based on their postmenstrual age.
- To compare the gaze following capabilities of preterm infants with full-term infants of the same chronological age and postmenstrual age.
Main Methods:
- Two experiments were conducted involving 7-month-old preterm infants and full-term infants.
- Infants' gaze following abilities were assessed and compared across different age groups (chronological and postmenstrual).
Main Results:
- Seven-month-old preterm infants demonstrated gaze following skills similar to 7-month-old full-term infants.
- Preterm infants' performance was not aligned with 4-month-old full-term infants (matched for postmenstrual age).
Conclusions:
- The duration of visual experience appears to be a more significant factor than postmenstrual age in the development of early gaze following.
- Findings suggest that early social interaction exposure aids preterm infants in developing gaze following skills.
- This highlights the importance of visual experience in cognitive development during infancy.
Abstract:
Gaze following is an essential human communication cue that orients the attention of two interacting people to the same external object. This capability is robustly observed after 7 months of age in full-term infants. Do healthy preterm infants benefit from their early exposure to face-to-face interactions with other humans to acquire this capacity sooner than full-term infants of the same chronological age, despite their immature brains? In two different experiments, we demonstrated that 7-month-old preterm infants performed like 7-month-old full-term infants (with whom they shared the same chronological age) and not like 4-month-old full-term infants (with whom they shared the same postmenstrual age). The duration of exposure to visual experience thus appears to have a greater impact on the development of early gaze following than does postmenstrual age.
