Visual Attention in Infancy

Abstract

Within the past 15–20 years, research on visual attention in infancy has grown voluminously. This research area, which did not exist as a discrete area prior to the pioneer reports of Berlyne (1958) and Fantz (1958), is primarily concerned with infants’ abilities to deal with incoming visual stimulation within the first 6 months of life. As the area has expanded, researchers have become increasingly sophisticated in terms of their conceptualizations of the processes involved as well as in the methods used to measure these processes. At this time, however, there appears to be no integrated overview of this research area that would examine it from the point of view of all of the separate processes involved. Previous review papers have tended to note empirical results without attempting to determine how the various findings may relate to the more basic processes that are thought to be involved. The division of visual attention in infancy into the two major areas of stimulus variables and novelty (Bond, 1972; Hershenson, 1967; McCall, 1970) no longer appears to be the most satisfactory way of conceptualizing the area.