by New research conducted by the University of Birmingham has found that babies as young as four months old are capable of understanding how their bodies interact with the space around them. The study, which was published in Scientific Reports, provides new insights into the development of self-awareness in infants.
The researchers at the Birmingham BabyLab conducted experiments where babies were shown a ball on a screen moving towards or away from them. When the ball was closest to the babies on the screen, they were given a subtle vibration on their hands, while their brain activity was measured.
The data collection for the study was carried out at Goldsmiths, University of London.
The study revealed that even at four months old, babies exhibit enhanced somatosensory (tactile) brain activity when they receive a touch following an object moving towards them.
Dr. Giulia Orioli, the lead researcher and Research Fellow in Psychology at the University of Birmingham, stated that the findings suggest that babies, even in the early stages of their development, possess a multisensory brain that can connect what they see with what they feel. This ability allows them to perceive their surrounding space and understand how their bodies interact within it, also known as peripersonal space.
As adults, we constantly use our combined senses to determine our position in space and predict when we will touch an object. However, the discovery that babies as young as four months old demonstrate signs of this ability raises questions about how much of this skill is learned versus innate.
The researchers also investigated how an unexpected touch would affect older babies in the study, namely those at eight months old. They discovered that when the touch on their hand followed the ball on the screen moving away from them, the babies’ brain activity indicated surprise.
Professor Andrew Bremner, a Developmental Psychology expert, suggested that the surprise responses observed in older babies imply that they did not anticipate the touch due to the visual direction of the object’s movement. This suggests that as babies progress through their first year of life, their brains develop a more sophisticated awareness of their bodies in relation to their surrounding space.
Moving forward, the researchers plan to expand on this study by including participants of different ages, both younger and older. The inclusion of adult participants can shed light on the brain activity patterns that infants are developing towards.
Additionally, the researchers aim to investigate if newborn babies exhibit early signs of these multisensory abilities. Although working with newborns presents challenges due to their sleep and feeding patterns, the researchers have had some success with this age group. Discovering whether babies just a few days old have a foundational sense of their bodies in space could provide insights into the origins of human consciousness, according to Dr. Orioli.
Overall, this research highlights the remarkable abilities of infants at an early age and raises captivating questions about the nature of self-awareness and the development of consciousness in humans.
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- Source: Coherent Market Insights, Public sources, Desk research
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Money Singh is a seasoned content writer with over four years of experience in the market research sector. Her expertise spans various industries, including food and beverages, biotechnology, chemical and materials, defense and aerospace, consumer goods, etc.
