Understanding Joint Attention: A Key Social Skill for Children
When two people look into each other’s eyes, they exchange a huge amount of information about their mood, wellbeing, and degree of interest in the other person. This type of connection is important for attachment and encourages sensitivity to the experiences of others, and typically emerges in the first few weeks of life. As a baby grows, they turn to their parents for their reaction to novel events and respond accordingly. Soon, they turn their heads to see what their parents are looking at. By joining their parents in their attention to something, they enjoy a new skill— joint attention.
Joint attention is one of the earliest social skills children use and emerges at around 9 months old. New parents might be surprised by how often typically developing children point and initiate moments of shared enjoyment. They bring their parents objects or bang on their high chair to get their parents' attention. These skills emerge so early in life that we once believed they were automatic, like breathing. In fact, joint attention skills they can be taught and it is crucial that we do.
Because skills build on other skills, deficits in joint attention skills impede social learning, which will impact the child’s later quality of life. Some children (and adults) find eye contact aversive but others just offer it seldom. They might not have gotten into the habit, or they might lack the skills to make use of the information available during joint attention episodes. When eye contact is stressful or overwhelming, a skilled clinician can substitute auditory cues for better learning. Whatever the approach, joint attention skills can be taught and should be because they are consistently related to better outcomes for children with autism.
