The sense of touch provides fundamental information about the surrounding world, and feedback about our own actions. Although touch is very important during the earliest stages of life, to date no study has investigated infants' abilities to process visual stimuli implying touch. This study explores the developmental origins of the ability to visually recognize touching gestures involving others. Looking times and orienting responses were measured in a visual preference task, in which participants were simultaneously presented with two videos depicting a touching and a no-touching gesture involving human body parts (face, hand) and/or an object (spoon). In Experiment 1, 2-day-old newborns and 3-month-old infants viewed two videos: in one video a moving hand touched a static face, in the other the moving hand stopped before touching it. Results showed that only 3-month-olds, but not newborns, differentiated the touching from the no-touching gesture, displaying a preference for the former over the latter. To test whether newborns could manifest a preferential visual response when the touched body part is different from the face, in Experiment 2 newborns were presented with touching/no-touching gestures in which a hand or an inanimate object -i.e., a spoon- moved towards a static hand. Newborns were able to discriminate a handto-hand touching gesture, but they did not manifest any preference for the object-to-hand touch. The present findings speak in favour of an early ability to visually recognize touching gestures involving the interaction between human body parts.

Addabbo, M., Longhi, E., Bolognini, N., Senna, I., Tagliabue, P., MACCHI CASSIA, V., et al. (2015). Seeing touches early in life. PLOS ONE, 10(9) [10.1371/journal.pone.0134549].

Seeing touches early in life

ADDABBO, MARGARET
Primo
;
LONGHI, ELENA
Secondo
;
BOLOGNINI, NADIA;SENNA, IRENE;TAGLIABUE, PAOLO EMILIO;MACCHI CASSIA, VIOLA MARINA
Penultimo
;
TURATI, CHIARA
Ultimo
2015

Abstract

The sense of touch provides fundamental information about the surrounding world, and feedback about our own actions. Although touch is very important during the earliest stages of life, to date no study has investigated infants' abilities to process visual stimuli implying touch. This study explores the developmental origins of the ability to visually recognize touching gestures involving others. Looking times and orienting responses were measured in a visual preference task, in which participants were simultaneously presented with two videos depicting a touching and a no-touching gesture involving human body parts (face, hand) and/or an object (spoon). In Experiment 1, 2-day-old newborns and 3-month-old infants viewed two videos: in one video a moving hand touched a static face, in the other the moving hand stopped before touching it. Results showed that only 3-month-olds, but not newborns, differentiated the touching from the no-touching gesture, displaying a preference for the former over the latter. To test whether newborns could manifest a preferential visual response when the touched body part is different from the face, in Experiment 2 newborns were presented with touching/no-touching gestures in which a hand or an inanimate object -i.e., a spoon- moved towards a static hand. Newborns were able to discriminate a handto-hand touching gesture, but they did not manifest any preference for the object-to-hand touch. The present findings speak in favour of an early ability to visually recognize touching gestures involving the interaction between human body parts.
Articolo in rivista - Articolo scientifico
Touch, Visual preference, Visual discrimination, Infants, Newborns, Sensorimotor experience, Visual experience.
English
2015
10
9
e0134549
open
Addabbo, M., Longhi, E., Bolognini, N., Senna, I., Tagliabue, P., MACCHI CASSIA, V., et al. (2015). Seeing touches early in life. PLOS ONE, 10(9) [10.1371/journal.pone.0134549].
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/10281/89300
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