What infant memory tells us about infantile amnesia: long-term recall and deferred imitation

Prerequisites of language acquisition in the newborn brain

Learning to decode and produce speech is one of the most demanding tasks faced by infants. Nevertheless, infants typically utter their first words within a year, and phrases soon follow. Here we review cognitive abilities of newborn infants that promote language acquisition, focusing primarily on studies tapping neural activity. The results of these studies indicate that infants possess core adult auditory abilities already at birth, including statistical learning and rule extraction from variable speech input. Thus, the neonatal brain is ready to categorize sounds, detect word boundaries, learn words, and separate speech streams: in short, to acquire language quickly and efficiently from everyday linguistic input.

Dynamic developmental changes in neurotransmitters supporting infant attachment learning

Infant survival relies on rapid identification, remembering and behavioral responsiveness to caregivers' sensory cues. While neural circuits supporting infant attachment learning have largely remained elusive in children, use of invasive techniques has uncovered some of its features in rodents. During a 10-day sensitive period from birth, newborn rodents associate maternal odors with maternal pleasant or noxious thermo-tactile stimulation, which gives rise to a preference and approach behavior towards these odors, and blockade of avoidance learning. Here we review the neural circuitry supporting this neonatal odor learning, unique compared to adults, focusing specifically on the early roles of neurotransmitters such as glutamate, GABA (Gamma-AminoButyric Acid), serotonin, dopamine and norepinephrine, in the olfactory bulb, the anterior piriform cortex and amygdala. The review highlights the importance of deepening our knowledge of age-specific infant brain neurotransmitters and behavioral functioning that can be translated to improve the well-being of children during typical development and aid in treatment during atypical development in childhood clinical practice, and the care during rearing of domestic animals.

State-Dependent Memory in Infants

Why do infants remember some things and not others? Human infants frequently cycle through different states such as calm attentiveness, wakeful activity, and crying. Given that cognitive processes do not occur in isolation, such fluctuations in internal state might influence memory processing. In the present experiment, declarative memory in 9-month-old infants (N = 96) was heavily state dependent. Infants exhibited excellent retention of a deferred imitation task after a 15-min delay if their state at encoding was identical to their state at retrieval (e.g., calm). Infants failed to exhibit retention if their state at encoding was different from their state at retrieval (e.g., calm vs. animated). Infant memory processing depends on internal cues.

Theory of mind: A foundational component of human general intelligence

To understand the evolution of general intelligence, Burkart et al. endorse a "cultural intelligence approach," which emphasizes the critical importance of social interaction. We argue that theory of mind provides an essential foundation and shared perspective for the efficient ontogenetic transmission of crucial knowledge and skills during human development and, together with language, can account for superior human general intelligence.

Cognitive Functioning in Children with Down Syndrome: Current Knowledge and Future Directions

Infants and children with Down syndrome (DS) can look forward toward bright futures, as individuals with DS are living healthier, more productive lives than ever due to medical advances, opportunities for early and continued intervention, and inclusive education. Despite these advances, infants and children with DS experience challenges in specific domains of cognitive functioning relative to their typically developing (TD) peers. Over the long term, individuals with DS are also more likely to develop Alzheimer's disease relative to the general population. Understanding cognitive functioning early in life may be important in charting cognitive decline over time. This chapter synthesizes the literature on cognitive functioning in infants and children with DS specific to general intelligence or IQ, language development, recall memory, and executive functioning, with additional focus on critical issues and future directions. These research findings provide important information for understanding cognitive competencies and intervention opportunities for children with DS and also serves to provide a foundation from which to plan longitudinal studies examining stability and change in cognitive functioning over time.

An Evolutionary Approach to the Study of Collaborative Remembering?

Hope and Gabbert (2008) and Jay and colleagues (in press) show us that collaborative remembering, in certain contexts, may result in incomplete and less accurate memories. Here, I will discuss the evolutionary origins of this behavior, linking it to phenomena such as social contagion, conformity, and social learning, which are highly adaptive and widespread across non-human taxa.

Entwicklung des Gedächtnisses bei präverbalen Kindern

Zusammenfassung. Gedächtnis ist eine elementare Fähigkeit, deren Entwicklungsverlauf insbesondere für das präverbale Alter bisher nicht eindeutig beschrieben ist. Zur Erfassung von Gedächtnisleistungen im präverbalen Alter werden verschiedene Verhaltensmaße herangezogen. Früheste Beobachtungen von Leistungen des impliziten Gedächtnisses sind über Präferenzverhalten in Paarvergleichs- und Habituationsaufgaben möglich und basieren auf einem Reizinformationsvergleich. Auch operant konditioniertes Verhalten in der Mobile- und Zug-Aufgabe indiziert eine implizite Gedächtnisleistung und basiert auf dem Lernen aus Konsequenzen. Imitationsverhalten als Leistung des expliziten Gedächtnissystems beruht auf Modelllernen in Aufgaben zur verzögerten Imitation. Sowohl im impliziten als auch im expliziten System sind im Entwicklungsverlauf Zuwächse der Gedächtnisleistungen hinsichtlich Kapazität, Behaltensdauer, Enkodiergeschwindigkeit und Flexibilität im Abruf beobachtbar. Die den Aufgaben zur Erfassung von Gedächtnisleistungen zugrundeliegenden Mechanismen deuten auf eine sukzessive Entwicklung zuerst des impliziten, dann des expliziten Systems hin.

Determinants of memory development in childhood and adolescence

Research on the development of memory has a long history and constitutes one of the most active research areas in the field of cognitive development. In this article, we first describe major historical developments in the literature on children's memory, focusing on systematic research that began in the late 1960s. We then examine new developments in the field, describing four important lines of inquiry: (a) the development of implicit memory, (b) short- and long-term memory development in infancy, (c) longitudinal research on memory strategies and metamemory, and (d) developmental cognitive neuroscience of memory. Finally, promising lines of future research on memory development are briefly discussed.

Anticipatory eye movements and long-term memory in early infancy

Advances in our understanding of long-term memory in early infancy have been made possible by studies that have used the Rovee-Collier's mobile conjugate reinforcement paradigm and its variants. One function that has been attributed to long-term memory is the formation of expectations (Rovee-Collier & Hayne, 1987); consequently, a long-term memory representation should be established during expectation formation. To examine this prediction and potentially open the door on a new paradigm for exploring infants' long-term memory, using the Visual Expectation Paradigm (Haith, Hazan, & Goodman, 1988), 3-month-old infants were trained to form an expectation for predictable color and spatial information of picture events and emit anticipatory eye movements to those events. One day later, infants' anticipatory eye movements decreased in number relative to the end of training when the predictable colors were changed but not when the spatial location of the predictable color events was changed. These findings confirm that information encoded during expectation formation are stored in long-term memory, as hypothesized by Rovee-Collier and colleagues. Further, this research suggests that eye movements are potentially viable measures of long-term memory in infancy, providing confirmatory evidence for early mnemonic processes.

Did the popsicle melt? Preschoolers' performance in an episodic-like memory task

Episodic memory has been tested in non-human animals using depletion paradigms that assess recollection for the "what", "where" and "when" (i.e., how long ago). This paradigm has not been used with human children, yet doing so would provide another means to explore their episodic memory development. Using a depletion paradigm, preschool-aged children were presented in two trials with a preferred food that was only edible after a short interval and a less-preferred food that was edible after the short and long intervals. Younger (mean = 40 months) and older (mean = 65 months) children tended to choose their preferred food after the short intervals, but did not switch to selecting their less-preferred food after the long intervals. Importantly, their choices did not differ with age. Although older children better remembered "what", "where", and "what is where" than did younger children, neither age group successfully estimated "how long ago" an event occurred. Finally, both age groups spontaneously recalled information about Trial 1. We also analysed the relation between the different measures used in the study but no clear patterns emerged. Results are discussed with respect to the cognitive mechanisms necessary to succeed in depletion paradigms and the measurement of episodic memory more broadly.

Can Babies Remember Trauma? Symbolic Forms of Representation in Traumatized Infants

Three important areas of current inquiry concerning early trauma-the respective roles of reality and fantasy, age-related capacity for the symbolic representation of trauma, and attachment status-are approached through clinical case reports of three children seen initially at very early ages. The findings are relevant to the issue of whether preverbal infants can experience traumatic events that later are available to interpretation. The focus is for the most part on event traumas-single harrowing, life-threatening experiences-occurring at quite early ages. Three main points are emphasized. First, toddlers and infants (including neonates) can experience intense pain and show symptoms of traumatization. They are capable of experiencing an event as harrowing and life-threatening. Second, these events are capable of being memorialized or symbolically represented, that is, stored in memory in a way that can affect later behavior and learning. Third, how that traumatization resolves itself, or fails to, can be decisively affected by the functioning of the attachment system.

Research on memory development: Historical trends and current themes

This article presents a survey of research on memory development conducted within the last 120 years. It begins with an examination of historical trends and then focuses on developmental trends over the last three decades. The article concludes with some predictions of future research activities and trends in this classic domain of cognitive development.

Children with autism respond differently to spontaneous, elicited and deferred imitation

BACKGROUND

Imitation, a key vehicle for both cognitive and social development, is often regarded as more difficult for children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) than for children with Down syndrome (DS) or typically developing (TD) children. The current study investigates similarities and differences in observed elicited, spontaneous and deferred imitation using both actions with objects and gestures as imitation tasks in these groups.

METHODS

Imitation among 19 children with autism was compared with 20 children with DS and 23 TD children matched for mental and language age.

RESULTS

Elicited imitation resulted in significantly lower scores for the ASD group compared with the other two groups, an effect mainly carried by a low level of gesture imitation among ASD children. We observed no differences among the groups for spontaneous imitation. However, children with ASD or DS displayed less deferred imitation than the TD group. Proneness to imitate also differed among groups: only 10 (53%) of the children with autism responded in the elicited imitation condition compared with all children with DS and almost all TD children (87%).

CONCLUSIONS

These findings add to our understanding of the kind of imitation difficulties children with ASD might have. They also point to the necessity of not equating various imitation measures because these may capture different processes and be differently motivating for children with autism.

The extended trajectory of hippocampal development: Implications for early memory development and disorder

Hippocampus has an extended developmental trajectory, with refinements occurring in the trisynaptic circuit until adolescence. While structural change should suggest a protracted course in behavior, some studies find evidence of precocious hippocampal development in the first postnatal year and continuity in memory processes beyond. However, a number of memory functions, including binding and relational inference, can be cortically supported. Evidence from the animal literature suggests that tasks often associated with hippocampus (visual paired comparison, binding of a visuomotor response) can be mediated by structures external to hippocampus. Thus, a complete examination of memory development will have to rule out cortex as a source of early memory competency. We propose that early memory must show properties associated with full function of the trisynaptic circuit to reflect "adult-like" memory function, mainly (1) rapid encoding of contextual details of overlapping patterns, and (2) retention of these details over sleep-dependent delays. A wealth of evidence suggests that these functions are not apparent until 18-24 months, with behavioral discontinuities reflecting shifts in the neural structures subserving memory beginning approximately at this point in development. We discuss the implications of these observations for theories of memory and for identifying and measuring memory function in populations with typical and atypical hippocampal function.

Associations among family socioeconomic status, EEG power at birth, and cognitive skills during infancy

Past research has demonstrated links between cortical activity, measured via EEG power, and cognitive processes during infancy. In a separate line of research, family socioeconomic status (SES) has been strongly associated with children’s early cognitive development, with socioeconomic disparities emerging during the second year of life for both language and declarative memory skills. The present study examined associations among resting EEG power at birth, SES, and language and memory skills at 15-months in a sample of full-term infants. Results indicate no associations between SES and EEG power at birth. However, EEG power at birth was related to both language and memory outcomes at 15-months. Specifically, frontal power (24–48 Hz) was positively correlated with later Visual Paired Comparison (VPC) memory scores. Power (24–35 Hz) in the parietal region was positively correlated with later PLS-Auditory Comprehension language scores. These findings suggest that SES disparities in brain activity may not be apparent at birth, but measures of resting neonatal EEG power are correlated with later memory and language skills independently of SES.

Recall memory in children with Down syndrome and typically developing peers matched on developmental age

BACKGROUND

Whereas research has indicated that children with Down syndrome (DS) imitate demonstrated actions over short delays, it is presently unknown whether children with DS recall information over lengthy delays at levels comparable with typically developing (TD) children matched on developmental age.

METHOD

In the present research, 10 children with DS and 10 TD children participated in a two-session study to examine basic processes associated with hippocampus-dependent recall memory. At the first session, the researcher demonstrated how to complete a three-step action sequence with novel stimuli; immediate imitation was permitted as an index of encoding. At the second session, recall memory was assessed for previously modelled sequences; children were also presented with two novel three-step control sequences.

RESULTS

The results indicated that group differences were not apparent in the encoding of the events or the forgetting of information over time. Group differences were also not observed when considering the recall of individual target actions at the 1-month delay, although TD children produced more target actions overall at the second session relative to children with DS. Group differences were found when considering memory for temporal order information, such that TD children evidenced recall relative to novel control sequences, whereas children with DS did not.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings suggest that children with DS may have difficulty with mnemonic processes associated with consolidation/storage and/or retrieval processes relative to TD children.

Learning verb syntax via listening: New evidence from 22-month-olds

Children recruit verb syntax to guide verb interpretation. We asked whether 22-month-olds spontaneously encode information about a particular novel verb's syntactic properties through listening to sentences, retain this information in long-term memory over a filled delay, and retrieve it to guide interpretation upon hearing the same novel verb again. Children watched dialogues in which interlocutors discussed unseen events using a novel verb in transitive (e.g., "Anna blicked the baby") or intransitive sentences ("Anna blicked"). Children later heard the verb in isolation ("Find blicking!") while viewing a two-participant causal action and a one-participant action event. Children who had heard transitive dialogues looked longer at the two-participant event than did those who heard intransitive dialogues. This effect disappeared if children heard a different novel verb at test ("Find kradding!"). These findings implicate a role for distributional learning in early verb learning: Syntactic-combinatorial information about otherwise unknown words may pervade the toddler's lexicon, guiding later word interpretation.

Socioeconomic disparities in neurocognitive development in the first two years of life

Socioeconomic status (SES) is strongly associated with cognition and achievement. Socioeconomic disparities in language and memory skills have been reported from elementary school through adolescence. Less is known about the extent to which such disparities emerge in infancy. Here, 179 infants from socioeconomically diverse families were recruited. Using a cohort-sequential design, 90 infants were followed at 9 and 15 months, and 89 were followed at 15 and 21 months. SES disparities in developmental trajectories of language and memory were present such that, at 21 months of age, children of highly educated parents scored approximately .8 standard deviations higher in both language and memory than children of less educated parents. The home language and literacy environment and parental warmth partially accounted for disparities in language, but not memory development.

The relationship between deferred imitation, associative memory, and communication in 14-months-old children. Behavioral and electrophysiological indices

The present study combines behavioral observations of memory (deferred imitation, DI, after a brief delay of 30 min and after a long delay of 2-3 weeks) and electrophysiological (event-related potentials, ERPs) measures of associative memory, as well as parental reports of non-verbal and verbal communication in sixteen 14-months-old children. Results show that for DI, the children remembered the stimulus after the brief but not after the long delay. There was a clear electrophysiological response indicating associative memory. Furthermore, a correlation between DI and ERP suggests that both measures of memory (DI and associative memory) tap into similar mechanisms in 14-months-old children. There was also a statistically significant relation between parental report of receptive (verbal) language and the ERP, showing an association between receptive language skills and associative memory.

Imitation of an action course in preschool and school-aged children: a hierarchical reconstruction

Imitation is commonly considered as a hierarchical process. The current study explored the reproduction of a multi-task course in deferred imitation. Eighty-five children between 3.5 and 7.5 years old were divided into five groups and instructed to watch a live human adult demonstrator who performed simple successive actions, such as walking, jumping, grasping, carrying objects from one location to another through six sessions. After a five-minute delay, the children were individually instructed to reproduce the course. Their responses were videotaped and coded in dichotomous data at two hierarchical levels, namely goals and their spatial location. The main findings showed no improvement in the replication of goals due either to age or trials. However, there was an improvement in the integration of the goals' spatial location over trials. This signifies that imitation is an active reconstruction mechanism hierarchically organized.

Elicited Imitation Performance at 20 Months Predicts Memory Abilities in School-Age Children

Over the first decade of life there are marked improvements in mnemonic abilities. An important question from both a theoretical and applied perspective is the extent of continuity in the nature of memory over this period. The present longitudinal investigation examined declarative memory during the transition from toddlerhood to school-age using both experimental and standardized assessments. Results indicate significant associations between immediate nonverbal recall at 20 months (measured by elicited imitation) and immediate verbal and nonverbal memory (measured by standardized and laboratory-based tasks) at 6 years in typically developing children. Regression models revealed this association was specific, as measures of language abilities and temperament were not predictive of later memory performance. These findings suggest both continuity and specificity within the declarative memory system over the first years of life. Theoretical and applied implications of these findings are discussed.

Theory of mind in children with traumatic brain injury

Theory of mind (ToM) involves thinking about mental states and intentions to understand what other people know and to predict how they will act. We studied ToM in children with traumatic brain injury (TBI) and age- and gender-matched children with orthopedic injuries (OI), using a new three-frame Jack and Jill cartoon task that measures intentional thinking separate from contingent task demands. In the key ToM trials, which required intentional thinking, Jack switched a black ball from one hat to another of a different color, but Jill did not witness the switch; in the otherwise identical non-ToM trials, the switch was witnessed. Overall accuracy was higher in children with OI than in those with TBI. Children with severe TBI showed a larger decline in accuracy on ToM trials, suggesting a specific deficit in ToM among children with severe TBI. Accuracy was significantly higher on trials following errors than on trials following correct responses, suggesting that all groups monitored performance and responded to errors with increased vigilance. TBI is associated with poorer intentional processing in school-age children and adolescents relative to peers with OI; furthermore, children with TBI are challenged specifically by intentional demands, especially when their injury is severe. (JINS, 2012, 19, 1-9).

Episodic and Semantic Autobiographical Memory and Everyday Memory during Late Childhood and Early Adolescence

Few studies have examined both episodic and semantic autobiographical memory (AM) performance during late childhood and early adolescence. Using the newly developed Children’s Autobiographical Interview (CAI), the present study examined the effects of age and sex on episodic and semantic AM and everyday memory in 182 children and adolescents. Results indicated that episodic and semantic AM both improved between 8 and 16 years of age; however, age-related changes were larger for episodic AM than for semantic AM. In addition, females were found to recall more episodic AM details, but not more semantic AM details, than males. Importantly, this sex difference in episodic AM recall was attenuated under conditions of high retrieval support (i.e., the use of probing questions). The ability to clearly visualize past events at the time of recollection was related to children’s episodic AM recall performance, particularly the retrieval of perceptual details. Finally, similar age and sex effects were found between episodic AM and everyday memory ability (e.g., memory for everyday activities). More specifically, older participants and females exhibited better episodic AM and everyday memory performance than younger participants and males. Overall, the present study provides important new insight into both episodic and semantic AM performance, as well as the relation between episodic AM and everyday memory, during late childhood and adolescence.

Deferred imitation in 9- and 14-month-old infants: A longitudinal study of a Swedish sample

This study investigated deferred imitation using a longitudinal design. A total of 62 Swedish children (32 girls) were tested at both 9 and 14 months of age. The memory delay interval was 10 minutes at 9 months and five minutes at 14 months of age. At both ages children in the imitation group displayed significantly more target actions after modelling than the children in the control group, thus replicating earlier reports of imitation from memory. It was found that individual children with a tendency to perform low deferred imitation at 9 months of age tended to remain low on the test at 14 months, thus raising the possibility of stable individual differences in imitation. This study provides a first investigation of deferred imitation longitudinally among young children, and supports recent theoretical claims that deferred imitation arises earlier in ontogeny than was hypothesized by classical theory. It was observed that there are cultural differences in the way that Swedish versus American adult-infant pairs act in the test situation and ideas are offered regarding the roots of such differences.

Imitationsfähigkeit von Kleinkindern in den ersten beiden Lebensjahren

Zusammenfassung. Die Imitation repräsentiert eine wichtige kognitive und sozial-kognitive Fähigkeit in der frühen Kindheit. In den letzten zwei Jahrzehnten konzentrierte sich die Kleinkindforschung hauptsächlich auf die Untersuchung der verzögerten Imitation als nonverbales deklaratives Gedächtnismaß und der Imitation im Zusammenhang mit dem Intentionsverständnis. Ergebnisse von Längsschnittstudien zeigen zudem, dass individuelle Unterschiede in der verzögerten Imitationsleistung mit weiteren kognitiven, aber auch mit sprachlichen und sozialen Fertigkeiten assoziiert sind. Studien, die neue Präsentationsmedien (z.B. Videopräsentationen) nutzen, konnten bisherige Ergebnisse zu zugrunde liegenden kognitiven Prozessen bestätigen. Darüber hinaus erweitern sie unseren Kenntnisstand über die Bedeutung der sozialen Interaktion für das Imitationslernen. Für zukünftige Forschungsarbeiten zu diesem Thema ergibt sich, dass aufgrund der engen Beziehung zwischen dem Imitationsverhalten und anderen Fertigkeiten umfassendere Längsschnittstudien erforderlich sind, die individuelle Merkmale des Kindes, aber auch Merkmale seiner sozialen Umgebung in der Analyse der Imitation stärker berücksichtigen.

Autobiographical memory development from an attachment perspective: the special role of negative events

The authors propose a novel model of autobiographical memory development that features the fundamental role of attachment orientations and negative life events. In the model, it is proposed that early autobiographical memory derives in part from the need to express and remember negative experiences, a need that has adaptive value, and that attachment orientations create individual differences in children's recollections of negative experiences. Specifically, the role of attachment in the processing of negative information is discussed in regard to the mnemonic stages of encoding, storage, and retrieval. This model sheds light on several areas of contradictory data in the memory development literature, such as concerning earliest memories and children's and adults' memory/suggestibility for stressful events.

Age-related changes in visual recognition memory during infancy and early childhood

Age-related changes in long-term memory during infancy and early childhood were examined using the Visual Recognition Memory (VRM) procedure. Independent groups of 1-, 2-, 3-, and 4-year-olds were familiarized with a visual stimulus and were tested either immediately or after a delay that ranged from 24 hr to 6 months. Although all age groups exhibited a significant novelty preference when tested immediately after familiarization, clear age-related differences emerged over longer retention intervals. We conclude that age-related increases in basic retention are a fundamental aspect of mammalian memory development and, in humans, these increases may play a vital role in the offset of childhood amnesia.

The development of children's early memory skills

A multitask battery tapping nonverbal memory and language skills was used to assess 60 children at 18, 24, and 30 months of age. Analyses focused on the degree to which language, working memory, and deliberate memory skills were linked concurrently to children's Elicited Imitation task performance and whether the patterns of association varied across the different ages. Language ability emerged as a predictor of immediate Elicited Imitation performance by 24 months of age and predicted delayed performance at each age. In addition to the contributions of language, children's abilities to search for and retrieve toys in the deliberate memory task were associated with their immediate Elicited Imitation performance at each age. In addition to language, working memory was positively associated with aspects of both immediate and delayed performance at all ages. The extent to which it was possible to replicate and extend previous cross-sectional work in this longitudinal study is discussed.

Transfer of learning between 2D and 3D sources during infancy: Informing theory and practice

The ability to transfer learning across contexts is an adaptive skill that develops rapidly during early childhood. Learning from television is a specific instance of transfer of learning between a 2-Dimensional (2D) representation and a 3-Dimensional (3D) object. Understanding the conditions under which young children might accomplish this particular kind of transfer is important because by 2 years of age 90% of US children are viewing television on a daily basis. Recent research shows that children can imitate actions presented on television using the corresponding real-world objects, but this same research also shows that children learn less from television than they do from live demonstrations until they are at least 3 years old; termed the video deficit effect. At present, there is no coherent theory to account for the video deficit effect; how learning is disrupted by this change in context is poorly understood. The aims of the present review are (1) to review the conditions under which children transfer learning between 2D images and 3D objects during early childhood, and (2) to integrate developmental theories of memory processing into the transfer of learning from media literature using Hayne's (2004) developmental representational flexibility account. The review will conclude that studies on the transfer of learning between 2D and 3D sources have important theoretical implications for general developmental theories of cognitive development, and in particular the development of a flexible representational system, as well as policy implications for early education regarding the potential use and limitations of media as effective teaching tools during early childhood.

Understanding the role of nutrition in the brain and behavioral development of toddlers and preschool children: identifying and addressing methodological barriers

The preschool years (i.e. 1-5 years of age) is a time of rapid and dramatic postnatal brain development (i.e. neural plasticity), and of fundamental acquisition of cognitive development (i.e. working memory, attention and inhibitory control). Also, it is a time of transition from a direct maternal mediation/selection of diet-based nutrition to food selection that is more based on self-selection and self-gratification. However, there have been fewer published studies in preschool children than in infants or school-aged children that examined the role of nutrition in brain/mental development (125 studies versus 232 and 303 studies, respectively during the last 28 years). This may arise because of age-related variability, in terms of individual differences in temperament, linguistic ability, and patterns of neural activity that may affect assessment of neural and cognitive development in pre-school children. In this review, we suggest several approaches for assessing brain function in children that can be refined. It would be desirable if the discipline developed some common elements to be included in future studies of diet and brain function, with the idea that they would complement more targeted measures based on time of exposure and understanding of data from animal models. Underlining this approach is the concept of 'window of sensitivity' during which nutrients may affect postnatal neural development: investigators and expert panels need to look specifically for region-specific changes and do so with understanding of the likely time window during which the nutrient was, or was not available.

Der Frankfurter Imitationstest für 36 Monate alte Kinder (FIT 36)

Um nicht sprachliche Gedächtnisleistungen von 36 Monate alten Kindern zu erfassen, wurde ein Verfahren zur Verzögerten Imitation entwickelt. Der Frankfurter Imitationstest (FIT 36) umfasst 40 Handlungsschritte, die sich aus acht Items mit vier bis sechs Einzelschritten zusammensetzen. Im Mittel imitieren Dreijährige (N = 82) 25 Handlungsschritte. In einer unabhängigen Reliabilitätsstudie (N = 24) konnte seine Test-Retest-Reliabilität mit r = .55 nachgewiesen werden. Im Vergleich mit den Gedächtnisleistungen im freien Abruf von Bildern, dem „Schatzkästchen“ sowie dem Untertest „Wörter erklären“ aus dem Wiener Entwicklungstest (WET) zeigten sich teilweise Zusammenhänge zur Imitationsleistung, die Hinweise auf die Validität des Tests liefern. Während sich bei der Durchführung der verbalen Gedächtnistests sowie dem „Schatzkästchen“ (WET) teilweise mangelndes Instruktionsverständnis bzw. Motivationsprobleme zeigten, wurde der FIT 36 durch seine starke Handlungskomponente von den Kindern engagiert ausgeführt. Der FIT 36 bildet eine wichtige Ergänzung zu Gedächtnisverfahren für Dreijährige.

Memory and representation in young children with Down syndrome: Exploring deferred imitation and object permanence

Deferred imitation and object permanence (OP) were tested in 48 young children with Down syndrome (DS), ranging from 20 to 43 months of age. Deferred imitation and high-level OP (invisible displacements) have long been held to be synchronous developments during sensory-motor "Stage 6" (18-24 months of age in unimpaired children). The results of the current study demonstrate deferred imitation in young children with DS, showing they can learn novel behaviors from observation and retain multiple models in memory. This is the first demonstration of deferred imitation in young children with DS. The average OP level passed in this sample was A-not-B, a task passed at 8-12 months of age in normally developing infants. Analyses showed that individual children who failed high-level OP (invisible displacements) could still perform deferred imitation. This indicates that deferred imitation and OP invisible displacements are not synchronous developments in children with DS. This asynchrony is compatible with new data from unimpaired children suggesting that deferred imitation and high-level OP entail separate and distinctive kinds of memory and representation.

Infant imitation from television using novel touch screen technology

Infants learn less from a televised demonstration than from a live demonstration, the video deficit effect. The present study employs a novel approach, using touch screen technology to examine 15-month olds' transfer of learning. Infants were randomly assigned either to within-dimension (2D/2D or 3D/3D) or cross-dimension (3D/2D or 2D/3D) conditions. For the within-dimension conditions, an experimenter demonstrated an action by pushing avirtual button on a 2D screen or a real button on a 3D object. Infants were then given the opportunity to imitate using the same screen or object. For the 3D/2D condition, an experimenter demonstrated the action on the 3D object, and infants were given the opportunity to reproduce the action on a 2D touch screen (and vice versa for the 2D/3D condition). Infants produced significantly fewer target actions in the cross-dimension conditions than in the within-dimension conditions. These findings have important implications for infants' understanding and learning from 2D images and for their using 2D media as the basis of actions in the real world.