Graduate

Peter Mundy, Ph.D.

Peter Mundy

Professor, Child Division
Director, Child Division
Director, Center for Autism and Related Disabilities
University of Miami, 1986

Peter Mundy, Ph.D. is a Professor of Psychology and Pediatrics. He is the Director of the Child Division and is also the Executive Director of the Center for Autism and Related Disabilities (UM-CARD), which provides services for over 3000 children and families. Dr. Mundys work has focused on the early development of visual attention, especially the ability to engage in coordinated joint attention with a social partner. His research on joint attention impairments in autism has contributed to improved diagnostic, early identification and intervention efforts for children with this syndrome. It has also contributed to advances in understanding the epigenetic, neurodevelopmental etiology of this disorder. Currently, his research examines the degree to which frontal systems involved in motivation, attention and self-monitoring moderate the course of autism. This work is conducted in collaboration with Dr. Heather Henderson and is supported by NIMH. In collaboration with Dr. Marygrace Yale, Dr. Mundy serves as a senior scientist on the University of Miami, CDC Autism & Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Project designed to identify the 8-year-old children in Miami-Dade County with autism and to examine the factors associated with the incidence and prevalence of this disorder. Dr. Mundy also directs the Marino Autism Research Institute (MARI) at the University of Miami (2005). This is a collaborative venture with Vanderbilt University and provides approximately $200,000 a year at UM for autism related research support. Dr. Mundy is a member of the national advisory board for the NIH Collaborative Projects of Excellence on Autism (CPEA) and the Studies to Advance Autism Research on Autism (STAART). He is the P.I. on a NICHD training grant (T32) on mental retardation and developmental disabilities. He has published over 100 chapters and articles on autism and related topics and is on the editorial board of Developmental Psychopathology and the Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology. In 2003, Mundy, Sigman, Ungerer & Sherman (1986) was selected as one of the most outstanding papers about communication in autism by the Japanese Society for Promotion of Research on Autism.

Research Interests

The primary focus of my research and theory development has been on the emergence of nonverbal social communication skills in the first two years of life. In the earliest phase of my career I collaborated on the development of the Early Social Communication Scales (ESCS; Seibert, Hogan & Mundy, 1982; Mundy, Hogan, & Doehring, 1996), a semistructured, video observational system for measuring early development across different categories of social communication skills. This measurement system has proven to be very useful in the study of both early typical and atypical social development and is being used in at least ten university laboratories in the United States, as well as in laboratories in France, Norway, and Australia.

In collaboration with Marian Sigman at UCLA, I applied the ESCS, and related models of infant development, to better understand some of the essential features of the social pathology of autism. This research suggested that joint attention impairment was a fundamental feature of autism. This observation, in turn, has contributed to current methods and criteria used in the diagnosis of autism, as well as to new perspectives on the nature and treatment of this disorder (Mundy & Crowson, 1997; Mundy & Neal, 2000; Mundy, Card and Fox, 2000). The study of the social deficits of children with autism, especially now among older, high functioning children, remains a focus of my research program. In addition, though, my program of studies also focuses on new lines of theory and research concerning the nature of joint attention development, as well as the continuity between infant joint attention and behavioral, cognitive and language outcomes in preschool children.

In this regard, one issue of concern for me is the nature of the connections between early joint attention skills and language development. Often research and theory have suggested that joint attention skill development in infants marks a readiness to learn that the may be capitalized upon by responsive caregivers. Hence, the link between joint attention and language may largely be mediated by variance in caregiver behavior (Carpenter, Nagel, & Tomasello, 1998). However, there has been a recent sequence of publications indicating that infant joint attention skills, even when measured apart from mother-child interaction, predicts language development (e.g. see Mundy & Gomes, 1998; Morales, Mundy, & Rojas, 1998 enclosed). Indeed, it may be that both infant skill and caregiver responsiveness contribute to the connections between joint attention and language development (see Markus, Mundy, et al. 2000 enclosed). With support from NICHD we have undertaken the largest longitudinal study of joint attention development to date with the explicit aim of exploring this issue. This research will examine the nature of the process that contribute to the continuity between infant joint attention development and individual differences in later language, cognitive and behavioral development. Interestingly, the connections between joint attention and language may depend, to some extent, on attachment status. In a sample of "secure" dyads, caregiver behavior in infant-cargiver joint attention interaction episodes was significantly related to infant language development, but not than in a sample of "insecure" dyads. Moreover the difference between the correlations for these groups was significant. Alternatively, infants' tendencies to initiate joint attention episodes in interactions with caregivers was significantly related to language development in insecure, but not secure dyads. Once again the difference in these correlations was significant across groups. These data suggest that, for some infants, joint attention skills may reflect self organizing functions that are critical to their optimal development. This notion is also integral to my current theoretical work on autism (Mundy & Neal, 2000).

The measurement of individual differences in early joint attention skills may also provide unique information about the developing social competence of the child that is related to subsequent behavioral outcome. In brief, numerous lines of theory may be brought to bear to suggest that more adequate joint attention development may be a marker of relative invulnerability to the development of behavior problems in "at risk" children (Mundy & Willoughby, 1996). We have been examining this hypothesis in a SAMHSA supported study of children exposed in-utero to cocaine and have a set of observations that is consistent with this hypothesis. We have observed that 12 to 15 month joint attention development is negatively related to a teacher reports of aggressive and disruptive behavior in a smaller sample of 32 children, and is also negatively associated with parent reports of externalizing behaviors in a larger sample of 47 children. In both cases these associations held even after considering covariance with language and cognitive development.

I have also become interested in the study of brain and behavior relations with respect to joint attention development. In collaboration with Nathan Fox at the University of Maryland, we have conducted a longitudinal study of toddlers from 14 to 18 months of age. In this study we used the ESCS and EEG to test hypotheses about developing cortical systems and joint attention development. This study revealed that Initiating Joint Attention skill (IJA) appeared be associated with a complex system of brain activity involving the left, medial-frontal cortex. Alternatively, a measure of Responding to Joint Attention skill was associated primarily with parietal activity (Mundy et al. 2000). These results converge with the recent observations of a connection between more mature social cognitive processes (e.g. false belief task performance) and left frontal medial cortical activity in adults. Thus, some forms of joint attention skill that emerge in infancy may be associated with activity in a cortical system that may also be associated with social cognitive processes that emerge later in development. This convergence of data may have implications for future research on the neuropsychology of autism, as children with this syndrome display deficits on social cognitive tasks as well as joint attention measures. This line of research may also be important to understanding the nature of joint attention, and with respect to the question of whether or not brain systems become dedicated to the regulation of social behavior.

Selected Publications

Mundy, P., Block, J., Vaughan Van Hecke, A., Delgadoa, C., Venezia Parlade, M., & Pomares, Y. (in press). Individual differences and the development of infant joint attention. [download .pdf]

Vaughan Van Hecke, A., Mundy, P., Acra, F., Block, J., Delgado, C., Venezia, M., Meyer, J., and Neal, R., & Pomares, Y. (in press). Infant joint attention, temperament, and social competence in preschool children. [download .pdf]

Mundy, P. & Sigman, M. (2006). Joint attention, social competence and developmental psychopathology. In D. Cicchetti and D. Cohen (Eds.), Developmental Psychopathology, Second Edition, Volume One: Theory and Methods, Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley. [download .pdf]

Mundy, P. & Acra, F. (2006). Joint Attention, Social Engagement and the Development of Social Competence. In P. Marshall & N. Fox (Eds.) The Development of Social Engagement Neurobiological Perspectives (pp. 81-117). New York, NY: Oxford University Press. [download .pdf]

Mundy, P. & Burnette, C. (2005). Joint attention and neurodevelopment. In F. Volkmar, A.Klin, & R. Paul (Eds.), Handbook of Autism and Pervasive Developmental Disorders, Vol. 3.(pp. 650-681). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley. [download .pdf]

Sutton, S., Burnette, C., Mundy, P., Meyer, J., Vaughan, A., Sanders, C., & Yale, M. (2005). Resting cortical brain activity and social behavior in higher functioning children with autism. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 46, 211-222. [download .pdf]

Sheinkopf, S., Mundy, P., Claussen, A., & Willoughby, J. (2004). Infant joint attention and 36 month behavioral outcome in cocaine exposed infant. Development and Psychopathology, 16, 273-293. [download .pdf]

Mundy, P. (2003). The Neural Basis of Social Impairments in Autism: The Role of the Dorsal Medial-Frontal Cortex and Anterior Cingulate System. Journal of Child Psychology & Psychiatry, 44, 793-809. [download .pdf]

Claussen, A., Mundy, P., Malik, S., & Willoughby, J. (2002). Joint attention and disorganized attachment status in at risk infants. Development and Psychopathology, 14, 279-292.

Mundy, P. & Neal, R. (2001). Neural plasticity, joint attention and autistic developmental pathology. In L. M. Glidden (Ed.), International Review of Research in Mental Retardation, 23, 139-168. New York:Academic Press.

Sheinkopf, S., Mundy, P., Oller, K., Steffens, M. (2000). Atypical vocal development in young children with autism. Journal of Autism and Related Disorders, 30, 345-354.

Markus, J., Mundy, P., Morales, M., Delgado, C., and Yale, M. (2000). Individual differences in infant skills as predictors of child-caregiver joint attention and language. Social Development, 9, 302-315.

Mundy, P., Card, J., & Fox, N. (2000). Fourteen month cortical activity and different infant joint attention skills. Developmental Psychobiology, 36, 325-338.

Morales, M., Mundy, P. & Rojas, J. (1998). Gaze following and language development in six-month-olds. Infant Behavior and Development, 21, 373-377.

Mundy, P. & Gomes, A. (1998). Individual differences in joint attention skill development in the second year. Infant Behavior and Development, 21, 469-482.