The Development of Circadian Rhythms in Human Infants

from the continuous minute data between bedtime and four hours after bedtime. For
each given night of monitoring, nine temperature readings were used to calculate the
maximum and minimum temperature achieved as previously conducted in similar
studies of infant physiology (Jackson et al., 2004).
4.2 Summary of development of core body
temperature during night time sleep
Figure 4.1 shows the change in minimum overnight core temperature for the
participant infants from 5 to 16 weeks of age. There is a gradual decline. This
decline is characterised as being more abrupt and occurring in two stages with a
period of transition when the change in minimum core body temperature achieved
during night time sleep is related to the infants‟ developmental age rather than
postnatal age (Figure 4.2).
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