Infant feeding behavior: development in patterns and motivation

Studies of feeding behaviors in human infants not only provide normative data but also allow analyses of the behavioral regulation. Twenty healthy full-term infants were observed by two examiners and were audiovisually and polygraphically recorded under standard conditions at 2, 10, 18, and 26 weeks of age prior to, during, and after breast- or bottle-feeding. The parameters of sucking, breathing and swallowing significantly changed during the first 6 months of age. At 2 weeks, infants were alert and visually attentive during sucking. Breast-fed infants had more opportunities for intimate social contacts than bottle-fed infants because breast feeding took significantly longer time than bottle feeding. Alert motor activities significantly shifted from the prefeeding to the postfeeding time during the first 6 months of age. Together with an increase in visual exploration and theta index in EEG, this shift seems to relate to developmental changes and interindividual differences in the intrinsic motivation.