Nutritional supplementation and the outcome of pregnancy. II. Visual habituation at 15 days

Abstract

Colombian women at risk of mild-to-moderate malnutrition were enrolled in a health care program and randomly assigned into nutritional supplementation and control groups at the beginning of the third trimester of pregnancy. One hundred unsupplemented and 144 supplemented infants were tested at 15 days of age: a 2 × 2 checkerboard was presented eight times followed by a single presentation of a 6 × 6 checkerboard. Unsupplemented infants showed less initial attention followed by slower habituation and higher levels of movement than the supplemented infants. The observed effect of maternal nutritional supplementation during the last trimester of pregnancy on new-born attention was interpreted to be maturational in nature.