BACKGROUND Progress in neonatal medicine has dramatically improved the survival rate of preterm births, but the evidence suggests that these low-birth weight infants (LBWIs) go on to develop pervasive development disorders and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) at greater rates than the general population. Children with neurodevelopmental disorders are known to suffer from deficits in visual cognition, such as in face perception and attentional functions, the characteristics of which already manifest in early infancy. PURPOSE This study aimed to investigate visual cognition in LBWIs during infancy. SUBJECTS 20 LBWIs and 20 normal-birth-weight infants (NBWIs: control) of age 9-10 months (corrected age was used for LBWIs). METHOD Children were held seated in front of an eye tracking system by a parent, and presented with facial photos as visual stimuli. During the familiarization phase, the child was presented with two images of the same human face (familiarization stimulus) on the left and right side of a display screen (5 × 10 s trials). Next, during the test phase, the child was presented with the same image on one side of the screen, and a photo of a different person's face (novel stimulus) on the other (2 × 5 s trials). Gaze behavior was assessed in terms of the total time spent looking at either facial stimulus, and specifically at the eyes of the stimuli, as well as the number of attentional shifts between stimuli, and novelty preference. RESULTS/DISCUSSION LBWIs spent significant less time looking at facial stimuli overall, and less time at the eye region, than NBWIs. These findings seem to evidence developmental differences in functions related to visual cognition.

中文翻译：

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低出生体重儿看不见眼睛吗？婴儿时期的人脸识别

背景 新生儿医学的进步极大地提高了早产的存活率，但有证据表明，这些低出生体重婴儿 (LBWI) 继续发展成普遍性发育障碍和注意力缺陷多动障碍 (ADHD)，其发生率高于一般婴儿。人口。已知患有神经发育障碍的儿童存在视觉认知缺陷，例如面部知觉和注意力功能缺陷，其特征在婴儿早期就已经显现出来。目的 本研究旨在调查婴儿期 LBWI 的视觉认知。受试者 20 名 LBWI 和 20 名正常出生体重婴儿（NBWI：对照），年龄 9-10 个月（LBWI 使用校正年龄）。方法 让孩子们坐在父母的眼动追踪系统前，并以面部照片作为视觉刺激呈现。在熟悉阶段，在显示屏的左侧和右侧向孩子展示相同人脸的两张图像（熟悉刺激）（5 × 10 s 试验）。接下来，在测试阶段，孩子在屏幕的一侧看到相同的图像，在另一侧看到不同人脸的照片（新刺激）（2 × 5 s 试验）。凝视行为是根据观察任一面部刺激所花费的总时间来评估的，特别是在刺激的眼睛上，以及刺激和新奇偏好之间的注意力转移次数。结果/讨论 与 NBWI 相比，LBWI 花费在整体上看面部刺激的时间要少得多，在眼部区域花费的时间也更少。