title: Human infancy…and the rest of the lifespan.
abstract: Human infancy has been studied as a platform for hypothesis and theory testing, as a major physiological and psychological adjustment, as an object of adults' effects as well as a source of effects on adults, for its comparative value, as a stage of life, and as a setting point for the life course. Following an orientation to infancy studies, including previous reviews and a discussion of the special challenges infants pose to research, this article focuses on infancy as a foundation and catalyst of human development in the balance of the life course. Studies of stability and prediction from infancy illustrate the depth and complexity of modern research on infants and provide a long-awaited reply to key philosophical and practical questions about the meaningfulness and significance of infancy.
authors.affiliation: Child and Family Research, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health, Public Health Service, Bethesda, Maryland 20892; email: Marc_H_Bornstein@nih.gov.
authors.forename: Marc H
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: Bornstein
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological / Q000502:physiology; D002657:Child Development / Q000502:physiology*; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D010551:Personality / Q000502:physiology*