Mouthing and fingering affect the achievement of play milestones

The current study is the first to examine the role of exploration in play milestones development using a multi-measure micro-analytic approach. Fifteen infants, between the ages of 8 and 17 months, were observed in their natural home environment once a month for a one-hour session; their spontaneous...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Early child development and care 2021-04, Vol.191 (6), p.837-846
Main Author:	Orr, Edna
Format:	Article
Language:	eng
Subjects:	Babies Child Development Cognitive Development cognitive growth Discovery Learning fingering Home environment Infant Behavior Infants manual exploration Motor ability Mouthing Object Manipulation Oral exploration Preschool children Social development Toddlers
Online Access:	Get full text
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Summary:	The current study is the first to examine the role of exploration in play milestones development using a multi-measure micro-analytic approach. Fifteen infants, between the ages of 8 and 17 months, were observed in their natural home environment once a month for a one-hour session; their spontaneous mouthing and fingering and their play level with objects were recorded. Four types of play acts were coded: single-object play, single-object sequences, multi-object play, and multi-object sequences. The relative degree of usage of each type of behaviour at each month was examined. The results show that a combination of mouthing and fingering supported most play acts. Mouthing alone supports the simplest type of play act while fingering supports an advanced type that involves a single or several objects combined in sequences of actions. The benefits of exploring the object orally and manually in the development of play behaviour are discussed.
ISSN:	0300-4430 1476-8275