# Flexibility in Infant Skill Acquisition

> **NIH NIH R01** · NEW YORK UNIVERSITY · 2022 · $617,533

## Abstract

Project Summary
 The proposed work on infant walking tests critical hypotheses about the development of
behavioral flexibility, a fundamental hallmark of motor skill. Flexibility is the ability to tailor motor actions
to changes in body-environment relations. Flexibility is essential to functional, adaptive action because
the body and environment are always in flux. Changes in local conditions—body growth, variations in
clothing/footgear, carrying objects, variations in ground surfaces, elevations, and obstacles in the path—
alter the biomechanical constraints on action. One theory of flexibility claims that learning particular
solutions to particular motor problems cannot ensure the ability to cope with the novelty and variability
that characterize everyday activity. Rather, infants must learn HOW to solve new motor problems by
exploring the current body-environment relations, discerning the critical information regarding which
actions are possible, and assembling appropriate solutions in the moment.
 The proposed experiments will test critical hypotheses generated by this theory. Aim 1 tests the
hypothesis that flexibility in infant walking generalizes across tasks with different body-environment
relations. We will test individual infants (from novice to experienced walkers) in four tasks—at the edge of
a precipice on slopes, drop-offs, bridges, and gaps. We predict that flexibility will generalize across tasks
and the level of flexibility across tasks depends on the duration of infants' everyday walking experience.
We also predict that more efficient, discerning exploratory behaviors predict higher levels of flexibility.
Aim 2 tests the hypothesis that experience with varied body-environment relations promotes flexibility.
Merely repeating the same actions over and over should not lead to flexibility. We will compare
responses by infants receiving intense training on a “body-environment obstacle course” to infants
receiving sham training and infants receiving only everyday walking experience. Aim 3 will identify critical
factors that instigate infants' experience with varied body-environment relations by comparing infants'
spontaneous locomotor activity in four toy conditions and two social-interaction conditions.
 The proposed studies use innovative procedures (a “body-environment obstacle course,” a new
cross-task normalization method, new ways of using head-mounted eye tracking) and technologies
(instrumented playroom floor to record spontaneous walking, gait modifications, standard measures of
gait maturity, path shape, distance travelled, and area explored) to move the field forward. The rich,
detailed data will be shared in the Databrary library for other researchers and clinicians to use to ask new
questions outside the scope of the proposed project. Findings will have important implications for
preventing accidental injury from falling from a height, a leading cause of injury in infants. A Scientific
Advisory Committee for Translationa...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10152636
- **Project number:** 5R01HD033486-25
- **Recipient organization:** NEW YORK UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Karen E Adolph
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $617,533
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 1996-05-24 → 2024-04-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10152636

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10152636, Flexibility in Infant Skill Acquisition (5R01HD033486-25). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10152636. Licensed CC0.

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