Biology of Sex Differences<\/em><\/a>, presented newborn infants with two side-by-side videos. One showed a human face with natural movement, representing a social stimulus. The other showed swinging metallic balls\u2014a Newton\u2019s cradle\u2014representing a non-social object.<\/p>\nOverall, newborns of both sexes tended to look more at the face than at the moving object. However, female infants spent a greater proportion of their viewing time looking at the social stimulus, while male infants spent a greater proportion looking at the non-social stimulus.<\/p>\n
The infants were tested only hours after birth, before prolonged exposure to family expectations, social interaction, education, or other postnatal experiences that might influence attention. The researchers therefore suggest that prenatal factors\u2014including genetic and hormonal differences\u2014may contribute to the observed group-level pattern.<\/p>\n
The study does not establish which prenatal factors are responsible. It also does not show that the newborns had different levels of intelligence, social ability, or attention in a broad clinical sense. The experiment examined one specific form of visual preference under controlled conditions.<\/p>\n
Why the study matters<\/strong><\/p>\nThe findings revisit a question that has been debated for decades: to what extent do biological factors contribute to psychological differences between males and females?<\/p>\n
A previous Cambridge study published in 2000 reported a similar pattern, with newborn girls looking longer at faces and boys looking longer at objects. The new research was intended as a more rigorous replication. The researchers used more controlled testing conditions and a more reliable method of recording infant gaze. Importantly, the people analysing the videos were not aware of the infants\u2019 sex or which stimulus they were viewing, reducing the risk of observer bias.<\/p>\n
The results support a view in which biological and social influences interact. As Professor Sir Simon Baron-Cohen, who supervised the study, put it, the relevant question is \u201cnature and nurture,\u201d rather than nature versus nurture.<\/p>\n
That interaction is central to interpreting the findings. A difference visible at birth may provide an initial tendency, but later experience can influence how that tendency develops, changes, or becomes less apparent. Family interaction, language exposure, education, culture, relationships, and individual experiences all continue to shape development.<\/p>\n
Group averages are not individual predictions<\/strong><\/p>\nThe researchers emphasize that the differences were observed between groups on average. They do not apply to all male or all female infants, and there was substantial variation and overlap between the groups.<\/p>\n
This distinction is essential. It would be inaccurate to conclude that newborn girls are inherently more social or that newborn boys are inherently more interested in objects. The experiment showed that, on average, female infants devoted a larger proportion of their gaze to the face than male infants did in this particular viewing task.<\/p>\n
Nor does the study support claims that sex determines later social skills, language development, autism, or other neurodevelopmental outcomes. The researchers are conducting follow-up work to investigate whether early differences in attention are related to later differences in brain development and behaviour. Any such relationship remains to be established.<\/p>\n
Source: <\/span>University of Cambridge<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A study of 130 newborns suggests that average differences in visual attention between female and male infants can be observed within hours of birth. The findings do not show that all girls and boys look at the world differently, nor do they prove that biology alone determines later psychological development. Instead, they add to evidence […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":25266,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1587],"tags":[7145,7144,4652],"class_list":["post-25265","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-research","tag-attention","tag-newborns","tag-university-of-cambridge-study"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25265"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25265\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25269,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25265\/revisions\/25269"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25266"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}