Stimulus, response, and state variables in the testing of neonates.
This paper endeavors to answer three closely related questions: What motor behavior displayed by an infant may be considered to be a response to acoustic stimulation? What acoustic phenomena elicit such behavior? Does responsiveness vary with postconceptual age? Review of our work over the past decade reveals that we know the answers to the first two questions, but not the third. Briefly, arousal responses (eye and limb movements) are reliably elicited by wideband signals but not by narrowband signals. However, there is still confusion about whether preterm infants are more or less responsive than full term infants.
D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D001143:Arousal; D001767:Blinking; D005260:Female; D005865:Gestational Age; D006319:Hearing Loss, Sensorineural / Q000175:diagnosis*; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D007235:Infant, Premature, Diseases / Q000175:diagnosis*; D007236:Infant, Small for Gestational Age; D008144:Loudness Perception; D008297:Male; D010898:Pitch Perception; D012306:Risk