Development
Can early motor training help babies at risk for autism?
Open access · cc by · source: Europe PMC
Infants at high risk for autism showed increased grasping and improved motor skills after using velcro 'sticky mittens' for two weeks.
Key findings
Following the two-week training, high-risk infants showed a significant increase in grasping duration, matching the performance of low-risk infants who received the same active training. Parents also reported significant improvements in gross, fine, and perception-action motor skills. However, unlike low-risk infants, the high-risk infants did not show a statistically significant visual preference for faces after training.
Methodology
The researchers trained 17 three-month-old infants at high risk for autism using Velcro 'sticky mittens' for 10 minutes daily over two weeks. This active motor training, implemented by parents, was designed to facilitate early reaching and grasping. The researchers compared these infants to 72 low-risk infants from previous studies who underwent various training protocols. They measured infants' grasping behaviors, parent-reported motor skills, and visual preference for faces.
Limitations
This study does not prove that early motor training can prevent or treat autism spectrum disorder. The design lacked a control group of high-risk infants who did not receive active training, making it hard to completely rule out natural developmental maturation or parental rating bias. Additionally, slight differences in experimental setups, such as screen sizes for the eye-tracking task, limit direct comparisons between high-risk and low-risk groups.
How this study connects
Role on claims
Each row is a claim on a concept or method page where this paper supports, challenges, or qualifies the statement. Roles are hand-checked — not a model guess.
Not yet placed on a claim. This paper has study layers, but no concept page yet cites it as support, challenge, or qualifier.
Related papers in this topic
Same topic cluster — not a recommendation engine.