Our Little Science Experiment

So, I got a call at work earlier this week from someone at the BYU Infant Development Lab. Apparently, they're doing a study on 5-month old babies, and asked if we would allow Joshua to participate, since he'll be 5 months old on Sunday (!!!). We scheduled a time of 9:15am on Friday, May 16th, and agreed to meet them over by the Joseph F. Smith Building.

Once we got there, we were led into a room and the two students there began to explain what they were doing. They wanted to test how infants process faces and voices. This involves putting a mesh beanie-type cap on the baby's head. The cap has little sensors all over it that test the thought processes and brain activity going on in the baby's brain. After putting the cap on the baby, the parent holds the baby in his/her lap while the baby watches a short, 2 1/2-minute film sequence. The film shows flashes of faces and says "Hi" simultaneously for awhile, then flashes the face and a delayed "Hi," and then a "Hi" and a delayed face flash. I hope that made sense. The point of this is to see if babies have the same reaction as adults when the face and the voice don't line up (like when the sound gets out of sync with the TV, and the mouths move differently from the voices you hear--that drives me nuts sometimes). Then they leave the cap on the baby's head for 5 minutes after the film ends, to have something to compare to. It all sounded rather interesting, so we agreed to let Joshua participate and signed the necessary forms.

Okay, I want to make sure you all understand: this test was completely harmless. Joshua was sitting on my lap the whole time, and the little sensors are merely little plastic pads. He wasn't in any kind of pain. In fact, he seemed fine with the whole thing, ableit a little confused at times. He did quite well, though he didn't seem to pay much attention to the film while it was going (they turned out the lights, but he kept looking around at everything but the TV...). The entire process only took about 15 minutes.

They even gave us a picture of our little guy as a keepsake. I have a feeling we can use it as blackmail once he gets older...Isn't that a cute picture? They also provided him with a certificate, thanking him for his service:
It was definitely an interesting experience. Hopefully they draw some good conclusions about how babies process faces and voices. And Joshua got to be a part of that! =)