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Article: Is the future of autism research to be found in the mirror.
- Article from:
- Pediatrics for Parents
- Article date:
- September 1, 2008
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2008 Pediatrics for Parents, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Humans are born with no capacity to care for themselves and survive only because of their ability to engage caretakers in the task. What humans need to know to survive, thrive and reproduce is learned in the crucible of parent/child interaction. In fact, human infants are "prewired" by evolution with the motivation and capacity to immediately establish a social relationship with their caretakers. Newborns, for example, will show a preference for the human voice (especially mothers) over other sounds and young infants the human face over other patterns.
Not surprisingly, human infants are born with a prodigious ability to imitate. Imitation of facial expressions ...