ReviewDevelopmental cognitive neuroscience2015
The functional foetal brain: A systematic preview of methodological factors in reporting foetal visual and auditory capacity.
Review in Developmental cognitive neuroscience, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 17 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
17 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- The functional foetal brain: A systematic review and meta-analysis.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2026Pooled it
- The impact of sound stimulations during pregnancy on fetal learning: a systematic review.BMC pediatrics · 2023Pooled it
- A cascading effects model of early sensory development in autism.Psychological review · 2026Review
- MRI evaluation of ADC values and venous variations in fetal cerebral white matter with T2WI signal hyperintensity in late gestation.Frontiers in medicine · 2026Article
- Neural Pathways of Visual Face Recognition Immediately After Birth.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- At First Sight: Fetal Eye Movements Reveal a Preference for Face-Like Configurations From 26 Weeks of Gestation.Developmental science · 2025Article
- The effect of adipose tissue on transdermal monochromatic light presented to the human fetus using Monte Carlo simulations.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- A postmortem high-resolution MRI study of the development of cochlear nerve-related structures in the second and third trimesters of pregnancy.Quantitative imaging in medicine and surgery · 2024Article
- Trajectories of brain and behaviour development in the womb, at birth and through infancy.Nature human behaviour · 2024Review
- The effects of maternal voice on pain during placement of peripherally inserted central catheter in neonates.Frontiers in pain research (Lausanne, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- An ode to fetal, infant, and toddler neuroimaging: Chronicling early clinical to research applications with MRI, and an introduction to an academic society connecting the field.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2022Review
- Tracking evoked responses to auditory and visual stimuli in fetuses exposed to maternal high-risk conditions.Developmental psychobiology · 2021Article
- Fetal eye movements in response to a visual stimulus.Brain and behavior · 2020Article
- Altered lateralization of dorsal language tracts in 6-week-old infants at risk for autism.Developmental science · 2019Article
- Exploring early human brain development with structural and physiological neuroimaging.NeuroImage · 2019Review
- Rapid Eye Movements in Sleep Furnish a Unique Probe Into Consciousness.Frontiers in psychology · 2018Review
- Distinct Opsin 3 (eNeuroArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Due to technological advancements in functional brain imaging, foetal brain responses to visual and auditory stimuli is a growing area of research despite being relatively small with much variation between research laboratories. A number of inconsistencies between studies are, nonetheless, present in the literature. This article aims to explore the potential contribution of methodological factors to variation in reports of foetal neural responses to external stimuli. Some of the variation in reports can be explained by methodological differences in aspects of study design, such as brightness and wavelength of light source. In contrast to visual foetal processing, auditory foetal processing has been more frequently investigated and findings are more consistent between different studies. This is an early preview of an emerging field with many articles reporting small sample sizes with techniques that are yet to be replicated. We suggest areas for improvement for the field as a whole, such as the standardisation of stimulus delivery and a more detailed reporting of methods and results. This will improve our understanding of foetal functional response to light and sound. We suggest that enhanced technology will allow for a more reliable description of the developmental trajectory of foetal processing of light stimuli.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.