Unit 2 Infancy and

Toddlerhood
Module 12 Physical Development of
Infants and Toddlers
 Cephalocaudal
and Proximodistal
Patterns
 Cephalocaudal Trend

Is the post-natal growth from

conception to 5 months when the
head grow more than the body.
 Proximodistal Trend

Is the pre-natal growth from 5

months to birth when the fetus grows
from the inside of the body outward.
 Height and Weight
It’s normal for newborn babies to drop 5 to
10 percent of their body weight within a
couple of weeks of birth.
Breastfeed babies are typically heavier than
bottle-feed babies through the first 6 months.
A baby’s weight usually triples during the
first year but slows down in the second year
of life.
 Brain Development
Myelination or Myelinization
 The process by which the axons are covered and
insulated by layer of fat cells, begins prenatally
and continues after birth.
• At birth, the newborn’s brain weighs about 25 percent of
its adult weight. By the second birthday, the brain is about
75 percent of its adult weight.
• The infant’s brain is literally waiting for experiences to
determine how connections are made.
• A study on rats conducted by Mark Rosenweig in 1969
revealed that the brain of rats that grew up in the enriched
environment developed better than the brain of animals
reared, in standard or isolated conditions.
 Motor Development

• Along this aspect of motor

development, infants and toddlers
begin from reflexes to gross motor
skills and fine motor skills.
 Reflexes
• There are different reflexes, some of the
common reflexes that babies have are:
 Sucking reflex
o The sucking reflex is initiated when something touches
the roof of an infant’s mouth.
 Rooting reflex
o The rooting reflex is most evident when an infant’s
cheek is stroked.
 Gripping reflex
o Babies will grasp anything that is placed in their palm.
 Curling reflex
o When the inner sole of a baby’s foot is stroked, the
infant responds by curling his or her toes. When the
outer sole of a baby’s foot is stroked, the infant will
respond by spreading other toes.

 Startle/Moro reflex
 Infants will respond to sudden sounds or movements by
throwing their arms and legs out, and throwing their
head back.
 Galant reflex
o The galant reflex is shown when an infant’s middle or
lower back is stroked next to the spinal cord.

 Tonic neck reflex

o The tonic neck reflex is demonstrated in the infant’s
who are placed on their abdomen.
 Gross Motor Skills
• This dramatic motor development is shown in
babies unable to even lift their heads to being
able to grab things off the cabinet, to chase the
ball and to walk away from the parent.
 Fine Motor Skills

• Fine motor skills, are skills that

involve a refined use of the small
muscles controlling the hand, fingers,
and thumb.
 Can newborns see?
• The newborn’s vision is about 10 to 30 times
lower than normal adult vision, by six months
of age, vision becomes better and by the first
birthday, the infant’s vision approximates that
of an adult.
 Can newborns hear?
• The sense of hearing and infant develops much
before the birth of the baby. When in the
womb, the baby hears his/her mother’s
heartbeats, the grumbling of his/her stomach,
the mother’s voice, and music.
 Can newborns feel pain, when they
respond to touch?
• They do feel pain. Newborn males show a
higher level of cortisol after a circumcision
than prior to the surgery.
• Babies respond to touch. A newborn
automatically sucks an object placed in his or
her mouth, or a touch of the cheek makes the
newborn turn his or her head towards the side
that was touch.
 Can newborns differentiate odors?
• In an experiment conducted by Mac Farlane in
1975, young infants preference for smelling
their mother’s breast pad when they were 6
days old who were breastfed showed a clear
 Can newborns distinguish the
different tastes?
• A study conducted with babies only two hour
old, babies made different facial expressions
when they tasted sweet, sour, and bitter
solutions. (Rosentein and Oster, 1988 cited by
Santrock, 2002)
• When saccharin was added to a amniotic fluid
of near-term fetus, increased swallowing was
observed.
 Do infants relate information through several
senses? In short, are infants capable of intermodal
perception?
• Intermodal perception is the ability to relate,
connect, and integrate information about two or
more sensory modalities such as vision and
hearing.
• In a study conducted by Spelke and Owsley 1979,
it was found out that as early as 3 and a half
months old, infants looked more at their mother
when they also heard her voice and longer at their
father when they also heard his voice.