Cortical Indexes of Saccade Planning in Infants

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Abstract
This article briefly reviews the development of cortical involvement in saccadic eye movement in young infants. A distinction between reflexive and voluntary saccadic eye movements is made, and developmental changes in the neural systems controlling these eye movements are discussed. Cortical indexes of saccade planning in adults have been measured using scalp-recorded, event-related potential (ERP). The ERP may be useful in distinguishing reflexive and voluntary saccadic eye movements in infants. In the remainder of this Thematic Collection, 3 studies are introduced that used ERP measures to infer saccade planning in young infants, and 2 short articles comment on these studies. The shift of attention to different regions of space is generally accompanied by eye movements. Even though shifts of attention may occur without eye movements (e.g., covert orienting), processing of fine visual detail, color, and form are most easily done by the fovea. Thus, eye movements function to center the fovea on a new location or on a stimulus located in a new location. The eye movements that are used to move the eyes from one location to another are high-velocity saltatory jumps of the eyes called saccades. Saccades to new locations may be the result of unexpected stimuli occurring in a location or may be the result of planned shifts of attention. It is often assumed that very young infants' saccades are reactive to stim - uli occurring in new locations and that planned eye movements do not occur in young infants. This article briefly reviews some background for this assumption