So we went back to the UCLA Baby Lab.  I didn’t know what to expect this time, but thought it would be the same thing that we did last time.  Hopefully, now that she was a couple weeks older, there would be more involved.  The last time we went in, they told us what they were doing, but as in results, there were none.

We were taken into a room with a darkroom/booth with the monitor screen in it.  The setup was the same as the last time, only this time, we were in a different room.  They adjusted the monitor so that it would detect the baby’s eyes very well and then tested it by playing the muppets (which by the way, my baby has no interest in).   She sat on my lap and they began the testing process.  They flashed images with tools, faces, animals, furniture, etc.  The testing was approximately 15-20min, which was a lot longer than the last time.  Between images, they had this image of an orbital module flash inwards and outwards with a galactic sound, as well as a rattle that went back and forth.  Every time they lost my baby’s attention, they would play this to put her back on track.

After the testing was over, the research assistant asked if I would like to watch the playback of what my baby was looking at.  When she played back the test, she explained that my baby had really great focus and was looking at faces of people.  Most babies her age cannot do this well, but she did (I admit that I did have a proud momma moment).  It showed that she was going to have great social skills.  The study was tuning into social skills between boys and girls at that age.  Boys look mostly at tools, while girls tend to look at social images, such as faces.  I found that to be fascinating at such a young age.

I think if you get the opportunity to be involved in their researches, you should definitely consider it.  Also, I was happy to see on their wall of pictures (which are all their babies that have participated in their studies) that some new celebrity mommies have brought their babies in for research.