Sitting and Smiling Behavior of Baganda Infants

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Abstract
Previous research has noted that the Baganda of Uganda are comparatively accelerated in the rate of their psychomotor development. As part of a longitudinal study of mother-infant interaction and infant psychomotor development during the first six months of life, when precocity had been found to be greatest, the present investigation reports on two psychomotor skills, smiling and sitting, which are socially significant to the Baganda themselves. Infants are encouraged and/or specifically trained in the development of these skills and perform them at an earlier age than the American norms on the Bayley Scales of Infant Development, the assessment instruments used. These findings provide additional support for the proposition that culturally constituted experience is importantly related to the psychomotor development of infants.