This study examined the effect of attention engagement
to compound auditory-visual stimuli on the modification
of the startle blink reflex in infants. Infants at 8, 14,
20, or 26 weeks of age were presented with interesting
audiovisual stimuli. After stimulus onset, at delays defined
by heart rate changes known to be associated with sustained
attention or attention disengagement, blink reflexes were
elicited by visual or auditory stimuli. Blink amplitude
to either visual or auditory stimuli was enhanced when
the infants were engaged in attention to the foreground
auditory-visual stimuli relative to control trials with
no foreground patterns. This enhancement of the blink amplitude
increased from 8 to 26 weeks of age. In contrast to selective
modality enhancement for single-modality foreground stimuli,
these results show that these multimodal stimuli engage
both visual and auditory attention systems in this age
range.