As their vision gets clearer, so too does their understanding
Your baby’s vision starts to develop before they are born, but at birth, sight is one of their less developed senses. When they were born, their vision was blurred and they were best able to focus on things that were close to them. The clarity of their vision will develop gradually over the first few months, but there is more to vision than the clarity of sight. Your baby’s brain has to develop in order to understand what they see and to begin to link this with their other senses.
Looking and reaching
As your baby’s vision is developing and as they have more experience of the things around them, they will begin to use what they see to help them to do the things that they want to do.
Your baby will begin to move their arms towards objects that they want to hold and explore. To do this, your baby has to develop their physical skills so that they can move their arms and hands in a controlled way. They also have to develop their cognitive skills as their movement involves making a judgement about distance and deciding to reach towards an object.
As their focus develops, these movements will change
Your baby might not be reaching accurately yet, but you might notice a change in what they do when they can see an object. At first, they might have looked at an object that was close to them but continued to move their arms and legs in a random, uncontrolled way. Now, you might notice that when you show them an object, they look at it and move their arms a bit less – they might seem to be focusing more on the object.[1]
They will begin to notice moving objects
They will continue to change what they do when they see an object, and in what is described as the mid-phase of the development of reaching, they will notice a toy or object and move more. They will move more quickly and move their hand towards the toy.[1] You might notice slight changes in how they move as they realise which movements bring their hand to the toy and they try to repeat these movements.
The science behind your baby's 'object-oriented' arm movements and 'goal-directed' reaching
Scientists studying the development of babies’ movements, and particularly the development of reaching, differentiate between object-oriented arm movements and goal-directed reaching.[2] Your baby will begin to move their arm towards a toy or object as they develop control of their movements, and as they can link what they can see with their movements, this is object-oriented arm movement. As they develop their control, the ability to judge distance and to plan how they want to move, they will be able to reach and grasp an object – this is goal-directed reaching.
Practice makes perfect (or soon something close to that!)
Your baby will develop the skills to reach for objects by exploring their movements and practising reaching and touching objects. Giving your baby time to look at and move their arms towards toys and objects will help them to develop the skills that they need to reach accurately.
Object exploration will start to make their world make sense
Your baby will continue to develop their physical skills and as they do this will link their movements with their actions. They will be able to reach and hold objects and then explore objects with their hands and mouth to find out more about them and develop their understanding of the world around them.
References:
[1] Bhatt, A.N. & Galloway, J.C. (2006) Toy-oriented changes during early arms movements: Hand kinematics. Infant Behavior and Development. 29(30) pp358-372.
[2] Lee, M-H, Ranhaathan & Newall, K, M. (2011) Changes in object-oriented arm movements that precede the transition to goal-directed reaching in infancy. Developmental Psychobiology 53(7) pp 685-693.