THE LABORATORY
A fundamental challenge in the study of children’s development is their inability to communicate their experiences to us. Therefore, we must devise clever methods to understand what they know and how they learned it.
Did you know…. that adult research provides us with a fundamental understanding of the behaviors and skills we study in childhood? Adult studies guide our expectations about the brain activity underlying these capacities and allow us to formulate hypotheses about how they developed, helping us design new studies for children! For this reason, we also invite adult participants into our lab to explore their cognitive abilities.
THE WELCOME ROOM
A researcher from our team will welcome you into a play space where your child(ren) can feel comfortable: the room has a changing table, games, books, and a desk.
This space can be used upon arrival but also for short breaks, such as breastfeeding or feeding, changing, napping, or relaxing.
If you arrive by car, ask us to reserve a spot in our free parking lot. When you arrive, we will give you directions to access it!
OUR TECHNIQUES
LENA
LENA is a recorder that allows us to learn about children’s early language experiences in their first years of life. It is a small device made to be worn for at least 12 hours during a day, as agreed upon with the family: the device is located inside the pocket of a vest like this one. LENA‘s recording technology automatically returns an analysis of the language environment the child is exposed to through estimates and graphs. With a complete picture, we can support your child’s peaceful and harmonious growth and foster optimal brain development. LENA is used with boys and girls between the ages of 2 and 48 months.
OR-SO, MotionWatch
In our project, we call OR-SO (ORologio del SOnno) the MotionWatch. It is a device designed to document physical movement and monitor the sleep-wake cycle in infants, children, and adults. It is shaped like a bracelet and is safe, compact, and lightweight. We use the OR-SO device to objectively measure the time your baby/child sleeps and analyze adult-child synchrony patterns in sleep-wake, daytime, and nighttime rhythms. OR-SO is also used with other tools to gather sleep quality measures and patterns.
ADAM-the voiced gaze
When you visit our lab, you can try ADAM, the game specially designed to study how memories of sounds and words are formed in early life. During the game, we will use an eye tracker like the one in the picture.
Eye-tracking is a technique that allows us to accurately track a child’s eye movements and, as a result of exposure to images and sounds, uncover the secrets behind early learning processes. To participate in this task, your child/children don’t need to be able to produce actual words because the processes of memory development begin well before this event!
Brain activity monitoring
We use noninvasive methods to track the brain activity of boys and girls. Specifically, we use fNIRS and EEG, which measure oxygenation levels and brain electrical activity, respectively. To detect this information, we use headphones with sensors specially designed for use with children of all ages, starting from the first days of life. Its use is for a limited period of time, typically 25 minutes. These brain imaging techniques offer the opportunity to discover, for example, how neural plasticity is associated with the ability to learn new words, sounds, and objects.