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Sensitivity to Visual-Tactile Colocation on the Body Prior to Skilled Reaching in Early Infancy

Jannath Begum Ali1,2, Rhiannon L Thomas2,3, Stephanie Mullen Raymond2

  • 1Birkbeck, University of London.

Child Development
|September 13, 2020
PubMed

Insights

Infants as young as 4 months can perceive when visual and tactile stimuli are in the same location. This bimodal perception develops before infants master reaching skills, showing early sensory integration.

Area of Science:

  • Developmental Psychology
  • Sensory Integration
  • Infant Perception

Background:

  • Infants integrate sensory information from different modalities.
  • Previous research indicated visual-tactile colocation perception in older infants' hands.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate visual-tactile perceptual colocation in young infants' feet.
  • To determine the age at which bimodal perception of colocation emerges.

Main Methods:

  • Two experiments compared 4- and 6-month-old infants' visual preferences for stimuli presented on the same or different feet.
  • Control conditions ruled out undifferentiated supramodal spatial coding.

Main Results:

  • Four-month-olds preferred colocated stimuli, while 6-month-olds preferred noncolocated stimuli.
  • Results demonstrate sensitivity to visual-tactile colocation on the feet by 4 months of age.

Conclusions:

  • Bimodal perception of visual-tactile colocation is present by 4 months of age.
  • This capability precedes the development of skilled reaching, highlighting early multisensory integration.

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