Modification and Validation of an Autism Observational Assessment Including ADOS-2 for Use with Children with Visual Impairment.

Children with visual impairment (VI) are at risk of autism spectrum disorder (ASD); however standard observational diagnostic assessments are not validated for this population. The primary objective of the study is to validate a modified version of the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS-2, Module 3), for children with VI. A cross-sectional observational study was undertaken with 100 (mean 5½ years, SD 10.

Mother-infant interactions with infants with congenital visual impairment and associations with longitudinal outcomes in cognition and language.

Background: This study investigated mother-infant interactions, including maternal maintaining of infant attentional focus and sensitivity, with infants with congenital severe and profound visual impairment (VI) and the association with developmental trajectories from one to three years.

Method: Fifty-five infants and mothers were video-recorded playing together with a standard set of toys at Time 1 (T1) mean age 12.95 months (8.

Detection vision development in infants and toddlers with congenital vision disorders and profound-severe visual impairment.

Aim: To investigate detection vision development in infants and toddlers with congenital disorders of the peripheral visual system (CDPVS) and severe to profound visual impairment (SVI/PVI).

Method: This was a longitudinal observational investigation of a cohort of infants with CDPVS (entry age 8-16mo) followed up 12 months later. Detection vision (Near Detection Scale [NDS]) and resolution acuity (Keeler Acuity Cards [KAC]) were assessed at each time point.

Home-based early intervention in infants and young children with visual impairment using the Developmental Journal: longitudinal cohort study.

Aim: To investigate the effects of home-based early intervention in children with severe visual impairment (SVI) using the Developmental Journal for babies and young children with visual impairment (DJVI).

Method: A longitudinal observational study was undertaken with a national cohort (OPTIMUM) of infants with congenital disorders of the peripheral visual system (CDPVS) and profound-SVI; and followed up after 12 months and 24 months. Intervention was categorized according to the practitioner diary records of their usual practice over 12 months from baseline comparing those receiving the DJVI and those receiving 'Other Support'.

Parenting stress, anxiety, and depression in mothers with visually impaired infants: a cross-sectional and longitudinal cohort analysis.

Aim: This study examined cross-sectional and longitudinal patterns of parenting stress, adult anxiety, and depression in mothers of children with profound or severe visual impairment (PVI or SVI) at 1 year and 2 years of age.

Method: Mothers of a national longitudinal cohort (OPTIMUM Project) of infants with congenital disorders of the peripheral visual system and PVI (light perception at best) or SVI (basic 'form' vision of non-light reflecting objects) participated. Infant age at baseline (T ) was 8 to 16 months.

Frontal EEG asymmetry and later behavior vulnerability in infants with congenital visual impairment.

Objective: Young children with congenital visual impairment (VI) are at increased risk of behavioral vulnerabilities. Studies on 'at risk' populations suggest that frontal EEG asymmetry may be associated with behavioral risk. We investigated frontal asymmetry at 1year (Time 1), behavior at 2years (Time 2) and their longitudinal associations within a sample of infants with VI.

Functional vision and cognition in infants with congenital disorders of the peripheral visual system.

Aim: To investigate how vision relates to early development by studying vision and cognition in a national cohort of 1-year-old infants with congenital disorders of the peripheral visual system and visual impairment.

Method: This was a cross-sectional observational investigation of a nationally recruited cohort of infants with 'simple' and 'complex' congenital disorders of the peripheral visual system. Entry age was 8 to 16 months.

Selective and faithful imitation at 12 and 15 months.

Research on imitation in infancy has primarily focused on what and when infants imitate. More recently, however, the question why infants imitate has received renewed attention, partly motivated by the finding that infants sometimes selectively imitate the actions of others and sometimes faithfully imitate, or overimitate, the actions of others. The present study evaluates the hypothesis that this varying imitative behavior is related to infants' social traits.

Infants show stability of goal-directed imitation.

Previous studies have reported that infants selectively reproduce observed actions and have argued that this selectivity reflects understanding of intentions and goals, or goal-directed imitation. We reasoned that if selective imitation of goal-directed actions reflects understanding of intentions, infants should demonstrate stability across perceptually and causally dissimilar imitation tasks. To this end, we employed a longitudinal within-participants design to compare the performance of 37 infants on two imitation tasks, with one administered at 13 months and one administered at 14 months.

CUE: the continuous unified electronic diary method.

In the present article, we introduce the continuous unified electronic (CUE) diary method, a longitudinal, event-based, electronic parent report method that allows real-time recording of infant and child behavior in natural contexts. Thirty-nine expectant mothers were trained to identify and record target behaviors into programmed handheld computers. From birth to 18 months, maternal reporters recorded the initial, second, and third occurrences of seven target motor behaviors: palmar grasp, rolls from side to back, reaching when sitting, pincer grip, crawling, walking, and climbing stairs.

Discrepancy between parental reports of infants' receptive vocabulary and infants' behaviour in a preferential looking task.

Two experiments are described which explore the relationship between parental reports of infants' receptive vocabularies at 1 ; 6 (Experiment 1a) or 1;3, 1;6 and 1;9 (Experiment 1b) and the comprehension infants demonstrated in a preferential looking task. The instrument used was the Oxford CDI, a British English adaptation of the MacArthur-Bates CDI (Words & Gestures). Infants were shown pairs of images of familiar objects, either both name-known or both name-unknown according to their parent's responses on the CDI.