Development of the Senses

Development of the Senses: Taking in the World

When proud parents peer into the eyes of their neonate, is the child able to

return their gaze? Although it was thought for some time that newborns

can see only a hazy blur, most current findings indicate that the capabili-ties of neonates are far more impressive. Although their eyes have a limited

capacity to focus on objects that are not within a seven- to eight-inch distance

from the face, neonates can follow objects moving within their field of vision.

They also show the rudiments of depth perception, as they react by raising their

hands when an object appears to be moving rapidly toward the face (Gelman &

Kit-Fong Au, 1996; Maurer et al., 1999).

Neonates can also discriminate facial expressions—and even imitate them.

As you can see in Figure 2 , newborns who see an adult with a happy, sad, or

surprised facial expression can produce a good imitation of the adult’s expres-sion. Even very young infants, then, can respond to the emotions and moods

that their caregivers’ facial expressions reveal. This capability provides the

foundation for social interaction skills in children (Meltzoff, 1996; Lavelli &

Fogel, 2005; Grossman, Striano, & Friederici, 2007).

In addition to vision, infants display other impressive sensory capabili-ties. Newborns can distinguish different sounds to the point of being able to

recognize their own mothers’ voices at the age of 3 days. They can also make

the subtle perceptual distinctions that underlie language abilities. For exam-ple, at 2 days of age, infants can distinguish between their native tongue and

foreign languages, and they can discriminate between such closely related

sounds as ba and pa when they are 4 days old. By 6 months of age, they can

discriminate virtually any difference in sound that is relevant to the produc-tion of language. Moreover, they can recognize different tastes and smells

at a very early age....