Monitoring of Communication Precursors in Extremely Low Birth Weight (ELBW) Newborns by Video Analysis Method: Preliminary Results.

ELBW infants at 12 months CA use predominantly eye contacts and gestural turns to communicate with adults. At 24 months CA, the child's communicative intention evolves from gestural to verbal communication. The latter is characterized by an increase in both vocal turns and the number of utterances produced during interaction. The video analysis we implement appears to be a sensitive tool for early assessment of communication and language development and to refine early intervention.