Development of reaching to the body in early infancy: From experiments to robotic models

Hoffmann, Matej; Chinn, Lisa K.; Somogyi, Eszter; Heed, Tobias; Fagard, Jacqueline; Lockman, Jeffrey J.; Ο’Regan, J. Kevin

doi:10.1109/devlrn.2017.8329795

Cited by 54 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…Likewise, opening the hand during reaching, although in part driven by central nervous system and maturational changes, may also be influenced by experience. Although we cannot easily vary experiential input to infants, often because of ethical issues, studies that use modeling with artificial agents in which input is systematically varied might help to provide answers to these questions (Hoffmann et al, 2017).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Development of Infant Reaching Strategies to Tactile Targets on the Face

et al. 2019

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Infant development of reaching to tactile targets on the skin has been studied little, despite its daily use during adaptive behaviors such as removing foreign stimuli or scratching an itch. We longitudinally examined the development of infant reaching strategies (from just under 2 to 11 months) approximately every other week with a vibrotactile stimulus applied to eight different locations on the face (left/right/center temple, left/right ear, left/right mouth corners, and chin). Successful reaching for the stimulus uses tactile input and proprioception to localize the target and move the hand to it. We studied the developmental progression of reaching and grasping strategies. As infants became older the likelihood of using the hand to reach to the target – versus touching the target with another body part or surface such as the upper arm or chair – increased. For trials where infants reached to the target with the hand, infants also refined their hand postures with age. As infants became older, they made fewer contacts with a closed fist or the dorsal part of the hand and more touches/grasps with the fingers or palm. Results suggest that during the first year infants become able to act more precisely on tactile targets on the face.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, such activation per se does not mean that the infant localizes the stimulus in the sense that she can reach to it. For that, the stimulation needs to be associated with other sensorimotor laws or contingencies (O’Regan, 2011; Hoffmann et al, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of Infant Reaching Strategies to Tactile Targets on the Face

et al. 2019

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“…In order to obtain a more comprehensive picture of how infants respond to tactile stimulation of their body and how they use their gradually developing body knowledge, further studies are needed in which other areas (ears, elbow, trunk, knees, etc.) are stimulated (see Hoffmann et al ., ). Third, the present study does not allow us to explore the possible mechanisms that might generate the observed behaviour and that might underlie infants’ early learning about their body.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Which limb is it? Responses to vibrotactile stimulation in early infancy

Somogyi

Jacquey

Heed

et al. 2017

British J of Dev Psycho

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This study focuses on how the body schema develops during the first months of life, by investigating infants’ motor responses to localized vibrotactile stimulation on their limbs. Vibrotactile stimulation was provided by small buzzers that were attached to the infants’ four limbs one at a time. Four age groups were compared cross‐sectionally (3‐, 4‐, 5‐, and 6‐month‐olds). We show that before they actually reach for the buzzer, which, according to previous studies, occurs around 7–8 months of age, infants demonstrate emerging knowledge about their body's configuration by producing specific movement patterns associated with the stimulated body area. At 3 months, infants responded with an increase in general activity when the buzzer was placed on the body, independently of the vibrator's location. Differentiated topographical awareness of the body seemed to appear around 5 months, with specific responses resulting from stimulation of the hands emerging first, followed by the differentiation of movement patterns associated with the stimulation of the feet. Qualitative analyses revealed specific movement types reliably associated with each stimulated location by 6 months of age, possibly preparing infants’ ability to actually reach for the vibrating target. We discuss this result in relation to newborns’ ability to learn specific movement patterns through intersensory contingency. Statement of contribution what is already known on infants’ sensorimotor knowledge about their own bodies 3‐month‐olds readily learn to produce specific limb movements to obtain a desired effect (movement of a mobile).infants detect temporal and spatial correspondences between events involving their own body and visual events. what the present study adds until 4–5 months of age, infants mostly produce general motor responses to localized touch.this is because in the present study, infants could not rely on immediate contingent feedback.we propose a cephalocaudal developmental trend of topographic differentiation of body areas.

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“…Differentiation of body responses has also been investigated by measuring infants’ responses to vibrotactile stimulation (Bremner et al, 2008; Begum Ali et al, 2015; Hoffmann et al, 2017; Somogyi et al, 2018; Chinn et al, 2019). In these experiments, the authors applied a vibrotactile stimulation on the infant’s body for several seconds at different locations (not simultaneously but one location after the other) and measured the ability of the infant to localize the buzzer on a specific body part.…”

Section: Body Knowledge: Is the Agent Able To Identify The Particularmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sensorimotor Contingencies as a Key Drive of Development: From Babies to Robots

et al. 2019

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Much current work in robotics focuses on the development of robots capable of autonomous unsupervised learning. An essential prerequisite for such learning to be possible is that the agent should be sensitive to the link between its actions and the consequences of its actions, called sensorimotor contingencies. This sensitivity, and more particularly its role as a key drive of development, has been widely studied by developmental psychologists. However, the results of these studies may not necessarily be accessible or intelligible to roboticians. In this paper, we review the main experimental data demonstrating the role of sensitivity to sensorimotor contingencies in infants’ acquisition of four fundamental motor and cognitive abilities: body knowledge, memory, generalization, and goal-directedness. We relate this data from developmental psychology to work in robotics, highlighting the links between these two domains of research. In the last part of the article we present a blueprint architecture demonstrating how exploitation of sensitivity to sensorimotor contingencies, combined with the notion of “goal,” allows an agent to develop new sensorimotor skills. This architecture can be used to guide the design of specific computational models, and also to possibly envisage new empirical experiments.

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Development of reaching to the body in early infancy: From experiments to robotic models

Cited by 54 publications

References 31 publications

Development of Infant Reaching Strategies to Tactile Targets on the Face

Development of Infant Reaching Strategies to Tactile Targets on the Face

Which limb is it? Responses to vibrotactile stimulation in early infancy

Sensorimotor Contingencies as a Key Drive of Development: From Babies to Robots

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