Blow on
If you blow on a baby or get a draft, it usually reacts reflexively by holding its breath and squeezing both eyes together. This is an innate, not arbitrarily controllable reaction that lasts for the first months of life and is a protective mechanism that is very similar to the respiratory reflex. Often, parents also use blowing on their babies in a targeted manner, so that crying babies, who simply cannot be calmed, are briefly interrupted in their crying attack.
Frightening
As a result of situations and stimuli that trigger a child’s fright, innate reflex movements are often triggered. They are intended to perform a protective function in order to shield the child’s body and deflect any possible danger that could affect it from the outside. An early childhood reflex that occurs in the first few months of a baby’s life after he has been frightened in various ways, for example in the form of optical or visual stimuli, is the Moro reflex. The baby’s mouth is opened, the arms are stretched up and then brought to the breast with clenched fists.
