Incredible Clinical Causes Beyond a Five-Month-Old Boy's Poor Feeding Include his Rapid Brain Cognition and Preference for Certain Colors: Case Report
Khajik Sirob Yaqob Qazaryan1*, Jawdat Sarsak2, Noor Saadi Yousif Akash3, Serdar Ghazi Pedawi4 and Qader Mohamed Salih5
1Specialist in Pediatric Neurology. MA, FRCPCH, Member of the RACGP, membership in the Kurdistan Pediatric Society, Iraq
2General Director in Amman Center for Speech, Language and Swallowing, Iraq
3Bachelor in Dental surgery (B.D.S), AL Yarmouk University, Iraq
4PhD in Pediatrics, F.I.B.M.S Pediatrics Iraq
5Assistant Professor of Pediatric Surgery-College of Medicine, Iraq
*Corresponding author: Khajik Sirob Yaqob Qazaryan, Specialist in Pediatric Neurology. MA, FRCPCH, Member of the RACGP, membership in the Kurdistan Pediatric Society, Iraq
Citation: Qazaryan KSY, Sarsak J, Akash NSY, Pedwai SG, Salih QM. (2023) Incredible Clinical Causes Beyond a Five-Month-Old Boy's Poor Feeding Include his Rapid Brain Cognition and Preference for Certain Colors: Case Report. J Neurol Sci Res. 3(1):1-9.
Received: May 08, 2023 | Published: May 25, 2023
Copyright© 2023 genesis pub by Qazaryan KSY, et al. CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 DEED. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-No Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International License. This allows others distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon the work, even commercially, as long as they credit the authors for the original creation.
DOI: http://doi.org/10.52793/JNSRR.2023.3(1)-24
Abstract
The study's abstract highlights the numerous clinical factors that contribute to a five-month- old boy's malnutrition in addition to inadequate feeding. These factors include color choice, early color vision, and mature brain cognition. Infants normally develop their sense of perception during their first year of life. This article emphasizes how a five-month-old baby can recognize colors, in particular red and blue ones. I also go through how, in very rare instances, the early development of color perception can have a clinical effect on feeding.This essay questions the widely held belief that babies under six months old can only recognize the colors white and black. This article presents the clinical data-based evidence that a child can distinguish between the colors red and blue at the age of five months and how, due to his abnormally advanced brain cognition and color perception development, he may determine for himself which color to choose. This article looks at how infants' perceptions of color are unrestricted in terms of knowing which color they choose to feel at ease with during feeding. This clinical example can help you better understand how children learn to recognize and perceive color. This article paves the way for future clinical studies on color perception and the early brain development of cognition.
Keywords
Neurobiology; Young toddlers; Cortical immaturity; Genetics
Introduction
Many studies that shed light on the views of visual and perceptual development in infancy were published and contributed to more than 10 years ago [1,2]. In this post, we'll talk about color perception and differentiation as well as how, clinically and amazingly, a 5-month-old infant may choose the hue he chooses to start eating while he's young. We might think of color as a key component in a child's early-life perceptual development as it relates to cognitive and brain development. Color is important in children's social communication because it allows us to assess how they develop from their initial sensory stimulation to later full comprehension and repulsive perception. Today, scientists fully understand how adult color vision functions. Considering that they make neurobiology, sensory mechanisms, and perceptual processes the primary study fields' core themes [3].
Color has a crucial role in cognition, such as the enjoyment of beauty, and the kid can use it to communicate and recognize things, situations, and faces [4]. A common element of the visual experience is color. In this article, we examine an important key finding on infant color perception for those working in pediatrics: how a five-month-old baby can choose among colors to the point where he can distinguish between them, indicating his mature color perception, and clinically, how his cognition affects his daily feeding. We will cite numerous related and important studies in support of this essay.
Moreover, we demonstrate how research on this topic works by presenting, for the first time, findings on many aspects of newborn color vision. helps paint a picture of how infants develop their perceptual abilities and how it also addresses difficulties that have wider implications for perceptual development. Regarding the generalizability of the research we present here, the studies have primarily focused on children from Iraq, the Kurdistan area, the Zakho district, and populations with low levels of education and moderate wealth. We discuss the effects of this restriction before wrapping up this piece.
What colors are seen during infancy?
Neonates lack cone photoreceptors, which are necessary for the perception of color. It's a common belief that young children can only see in black and white. However, some colors are even recognizable to young toddlers. Because newborns have poor color vision, colored stimuli must be extremely saturated, quite large, and of a specific kind (like red) in order to be seen [5]. One study indicated that, when presented with a gray background, 75% of neonates gravitated toward large, intensely saturated red spots, but that more than 85% of neonates had trouble adjusting to a blue patch [5]. This poor color perception is a result of both retinal and cortical immaturity. Neonatals are unable to perceive color because they lack cone photoreceptors. Similar to the mature retina's cones in length or complexity of arrangement (for an illustration) [6].
Development of color vision
Three different types of cone photoreceptors play a key role in the development of color vision in humans. Their spectral sensitivity peaks at long (L-cones, reddish light), medium (M-cones, greenish light), and short (S-cones, bluish light) wavelengths. The signals from these cones are combined into two retinogeniculate processes known as the red-green and blue-yellow cone-opponent channels. According to Teller [7], babies become trichromatic (both opposing channels are fully established) by the time they are 3 to 4 months old. The blue-yellow color mechanism is thought to develop 4 to 8 weeks after the red-green color mechanism. Psychophysical methods and visual-evoked potentials were used for this. People are assumed to develop their color vision in response to environmental influences, such as exposure to different hues and genetics.
Three different types of cone photoreceptors play a key role in the development of color vision in humans. Their spectral sensitivity peaks at long (L-cones, reddish light), medium (M-cones, greenish light), and short (S-cones, bluish light) wavelengths.
These cones' signals are integrated into the so-called red-green and blue-yellow cone- opponent channels, two retinogeniculate processes. Teller, 1998, suggested that the blue- yellow color mechanism develops 4 to 8 weeks after the red-green color mechanism and that infants become trichromatic (both con-opponent channels are fully developed) by 3 to 4 months of age. This was done using psychophysical techniques and visual-evoked potentials. Environmental experiences, such as exposure to various colors, and genetic factors are thought to influence how people acquire their color vision. colored stimuli. e- opponent mechanisms are active) by 3 months.
However, a trichromatic infant has a relatively poor ability to detect desaturated (less intense) colors. This is because the cones responsible for perceiving color in the retina are not fully matured at this stage. As the infant continues to grow and develop, their ability to perceive and discriminate between different shades of color improves.
According to Knoblauch et al. [8], the development of color vision in infants is influenced by both genetic factors and environmental experiences. Genetic factors determine the basic structure and function of the cones in the retina, while environmental experiences, such as exposure to different colored stimuli, play a crucial role in shaping and refining color perception. The role of genetic factors in the development of color vision in infants: Expand on how genes play a vital role in determining the basic structure and function of cones perception.
Research has shown that infants who are exposed to a variety of colors early on tend to have more advanced color discrimination abilities later in life. This shows that exposing children to a rich and varied visual environment can have a positive effect on how their color vision and perception develop. According to research, young children who are exposed to a diversity of hues have later-life color-discriminating skills that are more sophisticated. This shows that giving newborns a rich and varied visual environment can have a positive impact on how well their color vision develops. The saturation thresholds reached adult levels in 2001, late in maturity. These results on color are consistent with the idea that visual discrimination takes a very long time to develop. Additionally, global motion is formed at the age of twelve, and visual acuity does not reach adult levels until seven years old [2].
The range of an infant's perception
Around three months old, babies start to use color information in ways that replicate complex perceptual processes once they are trichromatic. When do infants start representing color perceptually using the perceptual dimensions of shade (roughly equivalent to the color's wavelength, for example, reddish and purplish), lightness (how much light is in the color, for example, dark and light), and saturation (how pure or intense the color appears, for example, vibrant and dull) that describe mature color perception?
According to Bornstein [8]. Skelton & Franklin [9] and Zemach et al., [7] researchers have observed that newborns favor shadow colors, with those under 3 months old spending the most time focusing on bluish colors, the most time on reddish and purple hues, and the least amount of time on green hues. time at yellow-greenish hues. Zemach et al. [7] and Brown & Lindsey [10] suggested that hue preference, rather than detection thresholds, saturation, or brightness, is the best explanation for these hue preference curves. The modeling of these curves also implies that luminance differences do not play a role. These findings suggest that 3-month-olds have progressed beyond a straightforward wavelength perception to separating out the perceptual dimension of hue from the other characteristics of color.
According to Brouwer & Heeger [11] neuronal representation is coded in terms of the sensory mechanisms in the extrastriate visual cortex, which is located downstream of the main visual cortex, where perceptual representations of color are assumed to emerge in adulthood. Therefore, newborns' representation of color at roughly three months old may signal a change in the process of development. and organization of infants’ visual cortex. There are also numerous other issues about the evolution of the perceptual dimensions of color and how they came to control the perceived similarity of hues.
Maximum likelihood conjoint measurement (MLCM) is a psychophysical technique that measures the relative importance of several aspects of a stimulus on a particular behavior. Through the use of signal detection theory, MLCM explains how covariation along several stimulus's qualities determines the probability of a decision between two stimuli [12].
According to Rogers [13] MLCM study, a sum of these dimensions rather than their interaction best predicts how 6-month-olds will respond to stimuli with variable chroma (approximately similar to saturation) and lightness. Understanding the perceptual organization of color in infancy is still in its infancy, but the MLCM offers a practical, psychophysically controlled method for research on the perceptual organization throughout infants' lives.
Another possible method is interdimensional salience mapping (ISM), which was used by Kaldy et al. [14] It uses forced-choice preferential looking to plot psychometric functions for the salience of various dimensions and allows for comparison of the contributions of various attributes (such as size, shape, and hue) to infant cognition when perceptual salience is equalized.
Classification of Color in Infancy Period: An Understanding
By 4 months, newborns not only seem to be able to register sensory color signals in terms of perceptual dimensions, but they also seem to categorically react to color. Bornstein et al. [15] see Maule & Franklin, [16] found that newborns' recognition memory divides distinguishable colors into five distinct color categories that agree with the basic color words red, green, blue, yellow, and purple.
Skelton et al. [17] study, which mapped newborn color categories onto the color space, employed the novelty preference method to identify the nature and causes of infants' categorical reactions. By selecting hue pairs throughout the hue circle, novelty preference was measured for one hue and infants' adaptation to another. Small hue changes in some regions produced a novelty reaction, although in some locations infants treated colours equally in their recognition memory despite being able to discriminate between them.
Furthermore, the infants' pattern of reaction was consistent with the traditional concept of categorization: Discriminably different stimuli were regarded as being equal. The idea that infants categorize color has been hotly debated and poses a problem for the common perception that color categories are entirely culturally constructed, according to Maule & Franklin, [16]; Siuda-Krzywicka et al., [18]. Despite the evidence that infants' recognition of color memory is categorical, these authors addressed the fact that infants' categorization of color has been shown to be categorical.
Although young newborns categorize a variety of inputs, including animals, faces, speech sounds, and objects, Westermann & Mareschal [19] claimed that categorization is a critical element of baby perception and cognition. Additionally, since there are no distinguishable qualities on which to base categorization, color offers an intriguing example of newborn categorization.
For instance, calculating the perceptual similarity of several visual aspects allows for the categorization of animals by young children. According to a [17] study by Skelton et al., four out of five newborns' categorical differences were divided along the cardinal axes of cone- opponent color vision, indicating the involvement of sensory mechanisms.
Understanding how categorization in infancy shapes lexical development depends in part on how infants categorize colors. By mapping newborn color categories, researchers (Skelton et al., 2017) were able to demonstrate how closely infants' categorization matched global color lexicons. Commonalities in color lexicons also exist, with the world's color names typically being centered around specific places in color space, despite the differences in how different languages define color (e.g., some use one term to include blues and greens). Additionally, Siuda-Krzywicka et al. [18] examined the issue of how infants' sensory systems that parse infant categories may in part restrain the development of their color lexicons.
Discussion
The worried parents of the five-month-old kid brought him to my clinic with the major concern that he had abruptly quit or had grown to despise his bottle-feeding for the previous seven days. Through a clinical examination and review of the patient's medical history, we looked for any associated causes of poor eating. Other than the boy's abrupt reduction in or cessation of daily breastfeeding, there were no other evident or apparent clinical signs that could be documented.
There were no indications of infant maltreatment, and the baby's parents appeared quite watchful and concerned for their son. We performed a clinical examination and were unable to find any evidence of oral infection, teething eruption which is not uncommon in this age, other infections like tonsillitis, oral thrush caused by Candida, or even the tongue tie, cleft lip and palate, which is typical at this stage of newborn development. In addition, the baby boy was mature, showed no evidence of brain atrophy, and had very good eye contact. To rule out these conditions as the underlying causes, cerebral palsy or paralysis, as well as brain atrophy, were essential Yaqoob, K., [20]. He has a normal brain MRI as well and no evidence of any congenital heart diseases that might underline the cause of his poor feeding. For instance cardiomyopathy or congestive heart failure.
Since birth, the newborn boy, who is now 5 months old, has been bottle-fed the same kind of milk. The parents made numerous attempts to switch the feeding bottle without success. The boy had also seen other clinical pediatricians without any improvement in his bottle intake. Since there was a complaint and no visible clinical symptom that could explain the scenario, I was wondering about the 5-month-old newborn boy. The infant was a healthy with a normal weight, length and OFC [20], and he smiles while having fun.
The milk type and bottle have been changed. All of these were ineffective attempts to get him to reef and suck the bottle feeding regularly even after prescribing antibiotics for unknown reasons. The infant child was oddly fixated on the bottle's color. Is it the color, perhaps? I exclaimed unexpectedly! I then asked right away to have the bottle's color changed from the currently-used white to blue. This case was incredible to a degree that his brain cognition was mature like those of preschoolers who can choose healthy and unhealthy food choices [20].
As a result, after attempting to use the new blue hue of the bottle for 30 minutes, something amazing occurred and was reported in my clinic. The five-month-old infant began quickly and forcefully drinking the blue bottle as he searched for a lost object. In my 20 years ofnclinical practice as a doctor, I had never encountered such an extraordinary and amazing case.
However, I was eager to continue monitoring this case as he grew and I saw his development. Clinical testing and follow-up allowed for the early detection of his brain's maturation in terms of cognition and development. The infant began reaching milestones before the expected age of development. At the ages of six months, eighteen months, and two years, he began to sit, walk, and speak clearly. More than one sentence.
According to Adams et al. (1994), the baby boy's retinal and cerebral maturity resulted in strong color detection and understanding. This is unusual for newborns, as we indicated, because the cone photoreceptors that produce color perception are not yet as developed or as densely structured as the cones of a mature retina [6]. During the first few months of life, this case was capable of detecting a wide range of colors, including red, white, black, yellow, and blue.bThe infant boy was also more than trichromatic and a genius since he was early in the development of both mechanisms. As a result, the blue-yellow and red-green color mechanisms in the 5-month-old boy were active and well-developed. Surprisingly, this trichromatic infant exhibits apparent mature visual discrimination that may be on par with adult levels and a relatively strong capacity to perceive desaturated (less vivid) colors [21] .
These results also corroborate studies by Bornstein [15], Skelton & Franklin [9], and Zemach et al. [7] that show this 5-month-old baby boy shows a predilection for shadow colors and looks longest at bluish hues. Furthermore, rather than focusing on detection thresholds, saturation, or brightness, the supporting research cited by Zemach et al. [7] and Brown & Lindsey (2013) might be used to explain such case results. These findings show that 5-month-olds have progressed from only experiencing wavelength to isolating the perceptual dimension of shadow from the other characteristics of color. Additionally, this 5-month-old boy's preference for specific colors is akin to a baby who, between the ages of 5 and 6 months, might prefer fruits, juice, and yogurt over milk in terms of food preference [20,22,23].
In Summary
Overall, color perception in infants may develop earlier than anticipated, as is the case in this example with a 5-month-old boy baby. It might even go farther; in this paper, we discussed how an infant's preference for a certain bottle hue may be influenced by quick brain cognition and may have a clinically significant impact on his nutrition, growth, and development.
The research on baby color perception suggests that during the first five months of life, visual and perceptual development happens extremely quickly. As newborns, infants can hardly sense color, but by the age of six months, they begin to exhibit signs of perceptual organization, classification, and maintenance of color constancy, and their sensitivity to color corresponds to the statistical regularities of natural scenery.
We made sure to emphasize throughout this post how color preference and food preference can be connected and taken into account for a baby's healthy development, growth, and nutrition. Insight into broader topics about perceptual development, such as the significance of sensitive periods, when brain regions acquire specialized regions for visual characteristics and processes, and the relationship between sensitive periods and newborn color preference, could also be gained through more research on infant color perception and preference. role of top-down and predictive processing in infants’ perception.
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