Healthy infants often change diets. In addition many infants have a suspected allergy or metabolic abnormality that requires a transition to a therapeutic diet. Often these new diets are rejected by infants for a period of time. The effectiveness of our method and device will be tested with infants between the ages of 1 and 5 months. The infants sucking of normal and novel diet will first be determined. Then following 1 to 7 days of training with our device infants will again be tested to determine if sucking has been facilitated. A delayed test of up to 24 days will be used to examine the longevity of the effect. We will test healthy babies and those required to switch diets by a physician. The method and device derived from basic research on the biological psychology of learning were further developed by our company.
As a Commercial product, this device has the potential to enhance the transition of infants to new diets, greatly reduce the disruption of switching to a new diet, facilitate the introduction of necessary supplements, and reduce the cost and duration of treatment of children requiring such intervention. He we intend to demonstrate and optimize the effectiveness of our product.
| Coyle, S; Arnold, H M; Goldberg-Arnold, J S et al. (2000) Olfactory conditioning facilitates diet transition in human infants. Dev Psychobiol 37:144-52 |
