Neonatal imitation and its sensorimotor mechanism

Simpson, E. L.; Paukner, Annika; Suomi, SJ; Ferrari, PF

doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199686155.003.0016

Cited by 8 publications

(9 citation statements)

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“…However, there has been little progress in the development of an adequate, empirically supported explanation of where this very early competency might come from and how it might work. The two dominant theoretical proposals identified by K&Athe active intermodal matching (AIM) model (Meltzoff & Moore 1997) and the mirror neuron account (e.g., Simpson et al 2015) are both very sparse and difficult to test. AIM names a set of separate, necessary components of an ability to imitate, along with the proposed links among them.…”

Section: W Tecumseh Fitchmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although this hypothesis has yet to be fully tested in humans, it has been tested in NHP (see recent review in Simpson et al 2016). Infant monkeys who fail to exhibit neonatal imitation, compared to imitators, are less socially attentive (Simpson et al 2014b), look less at faces in general and the eyes in particular (Paukner et al 2014), exhibit poorer social cognitive skills such as imitation recognition (Simpson et al 2015) and gaze following (Simpson et al 2016), exhibit poorer goal-directed motor skills (Ferrari et al 2009b), play less with peers and exhibit more anxious behaviour at one year of age (Kaburu et al 2016). Together, these studies provide a more detailed view of the link between neonatal imitation, early social predispositions, and social development.…”

Section: Animal Studies Help Clarify Misunderstandings About Neonatalmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Neonatal imitation in context: Sensorimotor development in the perinatal period

Keven

Akins

2016

Behav Brain Sci

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Some individuals have a neurogenetic vulnerability to developing strong facilitation of ingestive movements by learned configurations of biosocial stimuli. Condemning food as addictive is mere polemic, ignoring the contextualised sensory control of the mastication of each mouthful. To beat obesity, the least fattening of widely recognised eating patterns need to be measured and supported. Main TextKeven and Akins use recent evidence on the development of respiratory and ingestive movements to criticise claims that mimicry of tongue protrusion plays a role in attachment to carers. This comment applies their criticisms to the notion that addiction to ingestion makes people unhealthily fat. Both sets of ideas are symptomatic of a syndrome of 'multisensory neglect' in research. Ignorance of the configured biological and societal stimuli to each mouthful of food or drink largely accounts for the continued failure to reduce the contribution of excess energy intake to obesity and the resulting disease, disability and distress.

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Section: W Tecumseh Fitchmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Animal Studies Help Clarify Misunderstandings About Neonatalmentioning

confidence: 99%

Neonatal imitation in context: Sensorimotor development in the perinatal period

Keven

Akins

2016

Behav Brain Sci

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“…In support of this proposal, a handful of reports link neonatal imitation and other aspects of development (recent review: 14 ). In humans, only one study examined neonatal imitation predictively and found it was associated with fewer looks away during an interaction at three months, potentially reflecting that imitators were more socially engaged 7 15 .…”

mentioning

confidence: 89%

Neonatal imitation and early social experience predict gaze following abilities in infant monkeys

Simpson

Miller

Ferrari

et al. 2016

Sci Rep

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Individuals vary in their social skills and motivation, the causes of which remain largely unknown. Here we investigated whether an individual’s propensity to interact with others measured within days after birth, and differences in infants’ early social environment, may predict a later social skill. Specifically, we tested whether neonatal imitation—newborns’ capacity to match modelled actions—and social experience in the first months of life predict gaze following (directing attention to locations where others look), in infant macaques (Macaca mulatta; n = 119). Facial gesture imitation in the first week of life predicted gaze following at 7 months of age. Imitators were better at gaze following than non-imitators, suggesting neonatal imitation may be an early marker predicting socio-cognitive functioning. In addition, infants with rich social environments outperformed infants with less socialization, suggesting early social experiences also support the development of infants’ gaze following competence. The present study offers compelling evidence that an individual difference present from birth predicts a functional social cognitive skill in later infancy. In addition, this foundational skill—gaze following—is plastic, and can be improved through social interactions, providing infants with a strong foundation for later social interaction and learning.

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“…It is often claimed that babies learn language through imitation (Lewis, 1936; Mowrer, 1960; Bloom et al, 1974; Kugiumutzakis, 1999; Schreibman, 2005; Arbib et al, 2008; Ghazanfar, 2013). Others believe that infant imitation is present from birth as a way to map the actions of others who are “like me” onto a representation of their own actions to understand the psychological states of others and the self (Meltzoff, 2005, 2007) via active intermodal mapping (AIM) (Meltzoff and Moore, 1994, 1997) or via a mirror neuron system (Gallese and Goldman, 1998; Rizzolatti and Craighero, 2004; Simpson et al, 2015). These issues surrounding theories on the mechanisms and utility of infant imitation have been reviewed recently (Hurley and Chater, 2005a,b; Jones, 2009; Ray and Heyes, 2011; Oostenbroek et al, 2013; Keven and Akins, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reliability of Listener Judgments of Infant Vocal Imitation

Long

Oller

2019

Front. Psychol.

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There are many theories surrounding infant imitation; however, there is no research to our knowledge evaluating the reliability of listener perception of vocal imitation in prelinguistic infants. This paper evaluates intra- and inter-rater judgments on the degree of “imitativeness” in utterances of infants below 12 months of age. 18 listeners were presented audio segments selected from naturalistic recordings to represent in each case a parent vocal model followed by an infant utterance ranging from low to high degrees of imitativeness. The naturalistic data suggested vocal imitation occurred rarely across the first year, but strong intra- and inter-rater correlations were found for judgments of imitativeness. Our results suggest salience of the infant's vocal imitation despite its rare occurrence as well as active perception by listeners of the imitative signal. We discuss infant vocal imitation as a potential signal of well-being as perceived by caregivers.

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Neonatal imitation and its sensorimotor mechanism

Cited by 8 publications

References 0 publications

Neonatal imitation in context: Sensorimotor development in the perinatal period

Neonatal imitation in context: Sensorimotor development in the perinatal period

Neonatal imitation and early social experience predict gaze following abilities in infant monkeys

Reliability of Listener Judgments of Infant Vocal Imitation

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