Postural Control During Reaching in Young Infants A strongDynamicstrong.pdfVIP

Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, Vol. 22, No. 4, pp. 507–514, 1998 Pergamon 1998 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved Printed in Great Britain 0149-7634/98 $32.00 + .00 PII: S0149-7634(97)00037-7 Postural Control During Reaching in Young Infants: A Dynamic Systems Approach ESTHER THELEN* AND JOHN P. SPENCER Department of Psychology, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA THELEN, E. AND J.P. SPENCER. Postural control during reaching in young infants: A dynamic systems approach . NEUROSCI ¨ BIOBEHAV REV 22(4)507–514, 1998.—We conceptualize the coordinated development of posture and reaching within Schoner’s (Ecological Psychology, 7:291–314, 1995) dynamic model of coupled levels of control: load, timing, and goal. In particular, the goal of postural stability must be maintained during a reach. Using longitudinal data from four infants followed from 3 weeks to 1 year, we show that coordination of the head with upper and lower arm activity is critical for successful reaching. First, infants acquire stable head control several weeks before reaching onset. Furthermore, reaching onset is characterized by a reorganization of muscle patt