YOU ARE HERE: LAT HomeCollectionsBabies  Through a newborn's
senses   May 11, 2013|Susan Brink | Susan Brink is a freelance
medical writer. Her book "The Fourth Trimester: Understanding,
Nurturing, and Protecting an Infant Through the First Three
Months," published by University of California Press, was
released this spring   • What appears to be direct eye contact
is more likely a baby studying the edge of a face. What appears
to be direct eye contact is more likely a baby studying the
edge… (Image Source / Getty Images )   Parents declare them
beautiful, these wailing bundles of wrinkles. But upon arrival,
far more than their physical appearance needs work. Indeed,
human newborns are the least neurologically developed primates
on Earth, their brains a mere 25% developed, compared with about
50% among others in the animal kingdom. Parents might well think
of human infants as final-phase fetuses who will spend their
first three months -- a fourth trimester -- crossing the divide
between womb and world.  Recen