Object use affects motor planning in infant prehension

Everyday interactions support toddlers' learning of conventional actions on artifacts

Children learn to perform actions on artifacts in their environments from infancy, but the ways caregivers support this learning during everyday interactions are relatively unexplored. This study investigated how naturalistic caregiver-child teaching interactions promoted conventional action learning in toddlers. Caregivers of 32 24- to 26-month-old children taught their children to perform novel target actions on toys. Afterward, an experimenter blind to the toys children had been taught tested children's action learning. Results indicated that children's propensities to assemble objects and vocabularies were positively associated with learning. Whereas caregivers' speech did not directly support learning, caregivers' action performance negatively related to children's learning. Importantly, children's own actions related to learning: Children who performed proportionally more actions relative to their caregivers with higher action accuracy demonstrated better learning of the taught material. Thus, children who "drove" the teaching session and were more accurate in their actions learned more. Caregivers contributed by supporting their children's actions: Caregivers who provided more specific instructions and praise had children who were more active during instruction. Importantly, analyses controlled for child-level individual differences, showing that beyond children's own skills, active experience supported by caregiver guidance related to conventional action learning. These findings highlight children as central agents in the learning process and suggest that caregivers contributed by coaching children's actions.

The Social Effect of "Being Imitated" in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

There is evidence that “being imitated” has social effects, and that the imitation of the child's actions may be used as a strategy to promote social engagement in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The observation of someone that imitates us recruits, indeed, neural areas involved in social cognition. We reviewed studies exploring the behavioral consequences of “being imitated” in children with ASD. We aimed at assessing what are the social skills targeted by this strategy, and the factors that may improve the response. The “being imitated” strategy improves social gazes, proximal social behaviors, and play skills, particularly in children with low developmental level, and also when the strategy is implemented by children's mothers. The “being imitated” may be used as a tool in early intervention to improve social skills, helping to assess the effects of intervention at both behavioral and neural level.

Innovative evaluation of dexterity in pediatrics

STUDY DESIGN

Review paper.

INTRODUCTION

Hand dexterity is multifaceted and essential to the performance of daily tasks. Timed performance and precision demands are the most common features of quantitative dexterity testing. Measurement concepts such as rate of completion, in-hand manipulation and dynamic force control of instabilities are being integrated into assessment tools for the pediatric population.

PURPOSE

To review measurement concepts inherent in pediatric dexterity testing and introduce concepts that are infrequently measured or novel as exemplified with two assessment tools.

METHODS

Measurement concepts included in common assessment tools are introduced first. We then describe seldom measured and novel concepts embedded in two instruments; the Functional Dexterity Test (FDT) and the Strength-Dexterity (SD) Test.

DISCUSSION

The inclusion of novel yet informative tools and measurement concepts in our assessments could aid our understanding of atypical dexterity, and potentially contribute to the design of targeted therapy programs.