Biobehavioral Assessment of the Infant

Recent decades have seen the emergence of many new biobehavioral assessment tools for the newborn and young infant. These instruments have tremendous utility for scientists and practitioners engaged in exploring basic questions of development, studying medical and developmental conditions that place infants at risk, diagnosing the severity of biobehavioral insult, and evaluating the effectiveness of ameliorative interventions. Yet until now there has been no single volume providing an organized, critical examination of available assessment tools. Filling a crucial gap in the literature, this book describes a wide range of approaches to evaluating growth, sensation, arousal, regulation, learning, and attention in the prenatal period and the first year of life. Leading experts describe the historical background and development of each tool; review its diagnostic, methodological, and conceptual utility; highlight strengths and limitations for different uses; and consider broader implications for understanding the development of infants at risk.

Lynn Twarog Singer, PhD,

Philip Sanford Zeskind, PhD, is Research Professor of Pediatrics at the University of North Carolina<en> Chapel Hill, Professor of Psychology at the University of North Carolina<en>Charlotte, and Director of Neurodevelopmental Research at Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte, North Carolina. For over 25 years, Dr. Zeskind has studied the effects of various prenatal and early postnatal experiences on the biobehavioral development of the fetus and young infant at risk, and how these variations in biobehavioral organization affect the future social experiences and subsequent course of infant development. Dr. Zeskind also directs the Carolinas Preterm Nursery Intervention Program (CPNIP), a family-centered program designed to improve the biobehavioral development of preterm infants while they continue to reside in the high-risk nurseries.