Have you ever wondered how babies learn to move their bodies? Our bodies have special helpers called reflexes that start working even before we’re born.
One important reflex is the Landau Reflex, which helps babies develop strong muscles in their neck and back.
This reflex starts working when babies are about 4 months old. When a baby is placed on its tummy, this reflex helps the baby lift its head, chest, and legs, too.
The Landau Reflex is like a built-in exercise program that helps babies get ready for crawling and walking.
In this article, we’ll learn all about this incredible reflex, how it works, when it should appear and disappear, and what might happen if it sticks around too long.
What Is the Landau Reflex?
The Landau Reflex is a secondary reflex that usually appears in babies around 4 months old. It helps to determine whether a baby is developing normally.
Primary reflexes are present at birth, while secondary reflexes develop as the baby grows.
To see the Landau Reflex, gently place the baby on its stomach, with its belly resting on your hand.
Instead of just falling, the baby will stretch its body, raise its head, and look ahead, which shows that it is trying to find a visual reference.
If the Landau Reflex is missing, it might indicate motor weakness or slower mental development. However, only a pediatrician can properly evaluate this. If you notice the reflex is absent, contact your baby’s doctor.
The Two Parts: Upper Landau and Lower Landau
Upper Landau starts when a baby is about four weeks old. When lying on its stomach, the baby lifts its head. After a month or two, the baby lifts its chest when raising its head.
Lower Landau begins after the baby turns four months old. In this stage, the baby extends and raises its legs while lifting its head and chest when on its stomach.
The Landau Reflex should disappear when the child is three years old. Once integrated, the child will lie on their stomach with their legs flat when lifting their head.
This reflex helps develop muscle strength in the back and neck and allows the baby to use their hands to grab objects, supporting skills like near vision and reading.
How the Landau Reflex May Challenge Your Child’s Progress?
We’re talking about primitive reflexes, special movements that help babies with head control, posture, and stability. These reflexes develop before birth and play important roles in your child’s growth.
For example, the Landau Reflex helps your baby lift their head while lying on their stomach. At around four weeks, babies can lift their heads, and by two months, they can lift their chests.
By four months, the Landau Reflex allows babies to raise their legs while lifting their head and chest.
These are all part of the developmental stages. As long as your baby can progress through these stages, the Landau Reflex should be fully integrated by age three.
Once integrated, the baby can lift their head while keeping their legs on the floor, helping with motor coordination.
Landau Reflex: Behind Focus Issues and Toe Walking?
This article discusses the Landau Reflex and how it might affect your child’s development and learning abilities. The Landau Reflex is important for motor skills, like lifting the head and chest while lying on the stomach.
If this reflex is not fully developed, it can cause challenges with concentration and organization and even lead to toe walking.
It’s important to remember that this article is not meant to diagnose or treat any specific condition.
If you notice issues with your child’s development or learning, it’s best to consult a trained professional. They can evaluate your child and guide how to help them.
The Role of the Landau Reflex in Postural Development
The Landau Reflex emerges several months after birth, playing a crucial role in a child’s postural development before naturally fading around 12 months.
When this primitive reflex fails to integrate properly, it can silently impact numerous developmental areas, creating a constellation of seemingly unrelated challenges.
Children with retained Landau may struggle with persistent low muscle tone and poor posture while also experiencing frustrating short-term memory difficulties that affect learning.
Physical manifestations often include leg tension leading to toe walking, weak upper body strength, and specific movement challenges like difficulty performing somersaults (where knees buckle when the head tucks under) or swimming breaststroke properly.
Perhaps most significantly, this retained reflex can disrupt proper stimulation of the prefrontal cortex—the brain’s command center—potentially causing attention, organization, and concentration issues that might be misattributed to other conditions.
Even children without obvious symptoms warrant screening as researchers continue finding new ways this persistent reflex might affect development.
Common Signs of Retained Landau Reflex in Children
If your child has a retained Landau Reflex, you may notice a few common signs, including:
1. Poor concentration
2. Struggles with attention and focus
3. Tension in the back of the legs
4. Knees extending slightly backward
5. Toe-walking
6. Weak organizational skills
7. Poor coordination between upper and lower body muscles
Harold Blomberg, in The Rhythmic Movement Method: A Revolutionary Approach to Improved Health and Well-Being, explains that if the Spinal Galant Reflex can’t be integrated due to a retained Landau reflex, it may lead to problems with hyperactivity and even bed-wetting.
These signs may indicate that a retained reflex could affect your child’s development, impacting their motor coordination, focus, and learning abilities.
The Concentration Connection
If the Landau reflex doesn’t develop properly or integrate within the normal timeframe, it may lead to poor muscle tone along the back of the body.
This can result in insufficient stimulation of the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that helps with concentration, attention, social decision-making, and organization.
A retained Landau reflex is often linked to the Spinal Galant Reflex, which can cause attention and focus issues in the classroom.
Because these two reflexes are often related, they can contribute to similar learning difficulties, but each must be addressed separately to help with the learning delays.
A retained Landau reflex can also affect short-term memory and executive functions, which may cause trouble in concentrating and organizing tasks. If your child struggles to remember facts or organize homework, it could be due to this retained reflex.
Balance Co-ordination and Toe Walking
If your child has a retained Landau reflex, they may experience tension in the back of their legs, causing their knees to extend backward or triggering toe walking after age five.
A retained Landau reflex prevents the upper and lower parts of the body from working together, which might explain why your child struggles with sports, runs into furniture, or has trouble with hand-eye coordination and other activities that come easily to other children.
These challenges are often linked to retained reflexes and skills that are not fully developed. However, many of these reflexes can be integrated with exercises that improve weak areas and strengthen basic skills.
Once the brain pathways are opened through movement exercises, your child will find it easier to focus, sit still, and pay attention, allowing them to learn more effectively in the classroom.
What If the Landau Reflex is Delayed or Missing?
The Landau reflex is a key developmental milestone that typically emerges around three to four months of age and fully develops by six months.
Suppose the Landau reflex is delayed or absent. It could indicate an underlying neurological concern, such as hypotonia (low muscle tone), hypertonia (increased muscle tone), or developmental delays associated with conditions like cerebral palsy.
However, not all delays point to a serious issue, as factors like prematurity, muscle weakness, or variations in individual growth can also influence reflex development.
A pediatrician can assess whether the delay is within a normal range or if further evaluation is needed. In some cases, early intervention therapies, such as physical therapy, can help strengthen muscles and encourage motor development.
Watching other milestones, such as rolling over, sitting up, and crawling, can provide a broader picture of a baby’s progress.
If you notice a persistent absence of this reflex beyond the expected timeframe, aiming for professional guidance can help ensure your child receives the support they need for healthy development.
Final Words
Now you know all about the Landau Reflex! This special movement helps babies develop strong muscles and learn important skills like lifting their heads, balancing, and coordinating their body parts.
This reflex should disappear by age three as babies learn more advanced movements.
Sometimes, this reflex stays too long, making it hard for kids to concentrate, organize their thoughts, or walk properly.
If you notice your child walking on their toes, having trouble focusing or bumping into things often, it might be because of a retained Landau Reflex.
The good news is that special exercises can help fix these problems! Remember, every child develops at their own pace, but if you’re worried about your child’s development, it’s always best to talk to a doctor who can help.
