Developmental psychophysiology is an emergent discipline that applies the technologies of psychophysiology to study developmental processes. The history of developmental psychophysiology reflects the unscripted dance of investigators moving in and out of disciplines, research questions, populations, clinical problems, physiological measures, and technologies. Developmental psychophysiology represents the products of scientific curiosity and ingenuity as investigators boldly attempt to apply new technologies to study classic problems and unanswered questions regarding the developmental trajectory of psychological processes. Unlike the psychologist, who studies both observable behaviors and subjective reports, the psychophysiologist investigates responses that do not require verbal responses or overt behaviors. Thus, the tools of psychophysiology provide developmental scientists with opportunities to expand the investigative envelope of inquiry to include the preverbal infant.

Before we can place developmental psychophysiology in perspective, we need to examine briefly the history of psychophysiology. Psychophysiology is at the crossroads of several disciplines, each with preferred models, paradigms, and measures. Unlike physiology with its focus on mechanism and structure or cardiology with its focus on clinical status, psychophysiology was driven by paradigms derived from psychology, often treating physiological parameters as if they were observable behaviors. The early psychophysiologists, defined by their use of the polygraph, applied the polygraph to “transform” unobservable psychological or mental processes into measurable physiological variables (e.g., Razran, 1961).

Early papers by Fere (1888) and Tarchanoff (1890) provide visionary statements of the paradigms that would define psychophysiology. Their papers focused on using electrodermal activity as indicators of psychological responses to a variety of stimuli.