Investigating Visual Attention in Infants with Prader-Willi syndrome
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Investigating the Allocation of Visual Attention to Salient Stimuli in Infants and Young Children with Prader-Willi Syndrome
IRAS ID
233447
Contact name
Anthony Holland
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Cambridge University Hospitals
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 10 months, 20 days
Research summary
Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS) is a genetically determined neurodevelopmental disorder, whose characteristics include early failure to thrive, later food preoccupation, and impairments in social functioning (Kennedy & Adolphs, 2012). Difficulties in social functioning develops throughout early childhood and become more evident in adolescence and adulthood. Specific difficulties lie in recognising and processing visual social cues and an inability to effectively interpret social situations, indicating impairments in visual and attentional abilities (Dimitropoulos, Ho, & Feldman, 2013). As well as impairments in the social domain emerging in infancy, people with PWS also develop an insatiable appetite and young children with PWS demonstrate difficulties in shifting their attention away from food (Dykens, Lee & Roof, 2011). Any already established impairments in visual attention might therefore also be further affected by food preoccupation.
This cross-sectional study aims to investigate, in infants and young children with PWS, the allocation of visual attention to salient stimuli, as compared to typically-developing controls, and to examine if and at what age attentional capture is disproportionally biased towards food. Established questionnaires and the assessments of eye gaze in structured settings with different visual images will be used to assess infants and children with PWS (N=28) between 12 and 30 months of age, and age-matched typically-developing infants (N=24) to investigate whether PWS infants and children are disproportionately biased towards food stimuli over neutral or emotional stimuli.
REC name
South Central - Oxford B Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
19/SC/0071
Date of REC Opinion
29 Jan 2019
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion