Temporal dynamics of spatial frequency processing in infants

The current study examined the temporal dynamics of coarse and fine spatial information processing in 7-to 8-month-old infants. The ability to discriminate between spatiallyfiltered images was assessed by measuring infants' spontaneous preference for a changing over no-changing image sequences. In Experiments 1 and 2, we found that infants were ableto discriminate between low spatial frequency (LSF) image sequences at shorter durations(150 ms) than was the case with high spatial frequency (HSF) images (300 ms). When the LSFand HSF changes were pitted against each other in hybrid images containing both spatial frequencies (Experiment 3), the 7-to 8-month-old infants showed a preference for the LSF change across all tested durations (150 ms to 600 ms). However, infants' processing of hybrid image sequences was modulated both by changes in the relative contrast energy betweenLSFs and HSFs (Experiment 4), and image duration (Experiment 5). Finally, we found that in 12-to 13-month-old infants, the shift toward HSF dominance occurred at shorter durationthan in 7-to 8-month-old infants (Experiment 6). Our findings are among the first to provide a temporal characterization of coarse-to-fine processing in infants' perception. Possible links to the development of specialized visual pathways are discussed.