Energy conservation in infants.

Energy acquisition through suckling has been widely studied in rat and human infants. Processes mediating energy conservation, however, have not received the attention that they deserve. This essay, in honor of Professor Jerry Hogan, discusses parallel behaviors used by rat and human mothers to minimize energy loss in their offspring.

Social influences on formula intake via suckling in 7 to 14-week-old-infants.

To investigate social influences on human suckling behavior, 25 healthy, full term, 7 to 14-week-old infants were each bottle-fed their own formula twice by their mother and once in each of four experimental conditions: (a) held, provided social interaction; (b) held, without interaction; (c) not held, provided interaction; (d) not held, without interaction. Volume intake (VI), Total Sucks, infant gaze direction, and time elapsed since the last feeding were determined. There were three major findings: (1) social interaction increased VI; (2) VI was linearly related to the time since the last feeding in held infants; (3) Total Sucks and VI were both highly correlated with privation length when infants did not look at the feeder and when fed by the mother.

On the road to obesity: Television viewing increases intake of high-density foods.

Television viewing (TVV) has been linked with obesity, possibly through increased sedentary behavior and/or through increased ingestion during TVV. The proposition that TVV causes increased feeding, however, has not been subjected to experimental verification until recently. Our objective was to determine if the amount eaten of two familiar, palatable, high-density foods (pizza and macaroni and cheese) was increased during a 30-min meal when watching TV.

The ontogeny of face identity; I. Eight- to 21-week-old infants use internal and external face features in identity.

A paradigm was designed to study how infants identify live faces. Eight- to 21-week-old infants were seated comfortably and were presented an adult female, dressed in a white laboratory coat and a white turtle neck sweater, until habituation ensued. The adult then left the room.

Sucrose attenuates a negative electroencephalographic response to an aversive stimulus for newborns.

Reports that sweet taste calms crying in newborns and is analgesic against the pain caused by a heel lance served as the basis for this study. Electroencephalographic (EEG) activity, heart rate activity, and infants' facial behaviors were recorded before and after a noninvasive, but noxious, heelstroke (procedure from the Brazelton Neonatal Behavior Assessment Scale). In a randomized and controlled trial, 34 newborns were administered 2 mL of water or sucrose solution before the heelstroke.

Biological and environmental determinants of childhood obesity.

Childhood obesity reflects the confluence of three factors that minimize attention to internal physiologic satiety signals: the release of central opioids through ingestion of sweets and fats, which induces a preference for such foods; the phylogenetic quality of extending meals in response to environmental demands, as in work schedules, or through finding patches of agreeable food that are safe to consume (this is exacerbated in impoverished children, whose activity is limited); the determination of food preference through social interactions renders feeding systems open to external influences such as mass marketing and television advertising. Alternative feeding modes are presented based on studies of childhood food preferences and how children may be influenced to choose more balanced and healthier diets.

Changing determinants of crying termination in 6- to 12-week-old human infants.

Developmental change in human infant crying termination was studied in 60 infants who were 6, 9, and 12 weeks of age. They qualified by spontaneously crying for at least 30 s during the study's first minute. Infants then received either 0.

Ingestion, suckling, and the problem of identity: using criteria in the classification of ingestive behavior.

The data reported by Nizhnikov et al. [Newborn rats first suckling experience: taste differentiation and suckling plasticity (2002)] do not support the authors' claim that they shed light on suckling mechanisms. A number of accepted criteria for identifying suckling are discussed in this review.

Breastfeeding is analgesic in healthy newborns.

Context: This study identifies a behavioral and nonpharmacologic means of preventing newborn pain.

Objective: To determine whether breastfeeding is analgesic in newborn infants undergoing heel lance-a routine, painful, hospital procedure.

Design: A prospective, randomized, controlled trial.

An evaluation of the effects of sucrose on neonatal pain with 2 commonly used circumcision methods.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to identify the least painful circumcision method.

Study Design: The infants were circumcised with either the Mogen or the Gomco procedure and were given a sweetened pacifier or a pacifier dipped in water. All infants had a eutectic mixture of local anesthetic cream applied before circumcision.

Suckling- and sucrose-induced analgesia in human newborns.

This experiment had three goals: 1. To identify the basis of sucking-induced analgesia in healthy, term, newborn humans undergoing the painful, routine, procedure of heel lance and blood collection. 2.