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This study examined the importance of target location (within vs. outside the visual field) on the relation between responding to joint attention and subsequent language development in 47 normally developing infants. The results supported a developmental progression in the infants' ability to locate targets from within to outside the visual field. In addition, individual differences in 15-month-old infants' ability to correctly locate targets outside the visual field was a unique predictor of expressive language at 24 months. Infants' ability to locate targets outside the visual field may demonstrate increasing capacities for attention regulation, representational thinking, and social cognition that may facilitate language learning. The implications of this study are discussed with regard to the usefulness of measures of responding to joint attention for identifying early language and developmental delays.
KEY WORDS: language development, joint attention, assessment, language delay, infancy
The ability of infants to respond to joint attention, or to follow the visual regard of others, may reflect the development of important social, cognitive, and self-regulatory skills associated with the capacity to acquire language (Baldwin & Baird, 1999; Bates, 1979; Bruner, 1977; Moore & Corkum, 1994; Tomasello, 1988, 1995). In fact, several studies have indicated that individual differences in the ability of 6- to 18-month-old infants to respond to joint attention are predictive of language ability at 24 to 36 months (Markus, Mundy, Morales, Delgado, & Yale, 2000; Morales, Mundy, & Rojas, 1998; Mundy & Gomes, 1998; Mundy, Kasari, Sigman, & Ruskin, 1995). These studies, however, used scores of responding to joint attention that did not take target location into account. Infant responses to targets both within the visual field (900 or less to the left or right of the infant) and outside the visual field (greater than 900 to the left or right of the infant) were combined to predict later language development.
Developmental changes in the ability of infants to locate objects outside their visual field implicate target location as an important consideration that may reflect cognitive and social advances important to later language development. The ability of infants to locate the focus of another person's attention follows a predictable developmental path. Before 12 months, responding to joint attention is typically limited to targets within the infant's visual field. Between the ages...