Our Research Explained

How do we study babies and young children?

A researcher holding up a plastic shape to a young child

We investigate the cognitive, language, social and emotional development in children from before birth through to the early school years. We are fortunate to have one of the largest Infant and Child Development Labs in the world, comprising the entire ground floor of a dedicated research building, with child- and parent-friendly facilities and dedicated parking.

Our facilities include multiple observational laboratories with cutting-edge equipment to enable sensitive recording of young infants’ abilities, including eye-tracking technology, electroencephalography (EEG), near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRs), electromyography (EMG), 4d foetal scanning, heart rate detection, galvanic skin response, and infrared motion capture.

A baby playing with toys whilst wearing a head-mounted eye tracker

Head Mounted Eye Tracking

Head mounted eye trackers allow us to explore infants’ and toddlers’ eye gaze during active play with novel objects.

A parent and child sat watching a screen with an animal displayed on it

Eye Tracking

An eye tracker is a camera that lets us see where on a computer screen or a live scene your baby is looking. Babies like to watch novel and surprising pictures and events. By analysing their eye movements, we can understand how they make sense of the world around them.

A baby wearing an EEG cap whilst watching a video with their parent

EEG

As our brains work, they send off little waves of electricity. If we measure these waves, we can find out what is happening in the brain. EEG is a method we use to do this. We have caps with built-in sensors for measuring these waves. With this method, we can see what patterns of brain activity occur when a baby is learning about words, objects or actions.

A young child playing with coloured blocks

Motion Capture

This method is used to record the movement of babies. This way we are able to see how babies plan and reach for objects of varying size or weight.

Behaviour Observation

We design studies that are like playing a game with your baby, and we observe how they respond or interact with the experimenter. Sessions can be recorded for later analysis.

4D Ultrasound Imaging

The 4D scans will measure detailed face reactions to both shapes of light and sounds. With the use of 4D ultrasound the 3D image is continuously updated, which consequently becomes a moving image, like watching a movie.

fNIRS

This method allows us to safely measure blood-oxygenation levels in the brain using infrared light. It is ideal for infant testing because it is quiet, non-invasive, and resilient to movement. It is mainly used for localising specific areas of brain activation during cognitive processing.

A baby sat in front of the wide-screen Smart Eye display

Head & Eye Tracking (Smart Eye)

This multi-camera system allows 90- to 360-degree head and eye tracking. We can understand where babies look at and where their head is located in space. The free and wide placement of cameras makes it ideal for many environments.

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