An infant or baby was a very young offspring of living beings, such as Humans, Vulcans, primates, or Capellan power-cats. Changelings referred to their infants as "newly formed". (DS9: "The Search, Part II")
While the term "fetus" applied to an unborn baby, the term "newborn" – or in some cases hatchling – generally described the first days of a baby's life following birth. Contrary to this, The Doctor stated that the unborn future-Naomi Wildman was "female, half-Ktarian, as a matter of fact, which should nearly double the infant’s gestation period." (VOY: "Fury") Pandronians referred to their infants as "egglings". (TAS: "Bem")
The proper way to hold a newborn baby was to support its back with one arm, and its head with the other hand. Leonard McCoy demonstrated this technique to Spock after he was given Eleen's baby to hold, but Spock preferred not to try it. McCoy also corrected Eleen's hold on the child, then spoke to the child in what James T. Kirk termed "an obscure Earth dialect" (baby talk). (TOS: "Friday's Child")
The term "newborn" could also be used to refer to anything that was newly formed. In 2285, Kirk referred to the Genesis planet as a newborn planet. (Star Trek III: The Search for Spock) In August 2151, Travis Mayweather joked that the crew complement of twenty-three of the Y-class freighter ECS Fortunate would not count newborn babies. (ENT: "Fortunate Son")
Characteristics[]
Infants were known for being squirmy and easily controlled. (TNG: "True Q"; TAS: "How Sharper Than a Serpent's Tooth")
Spock compared the experience of his telepathic contact with the Lactrans as having learned "about as much as a mother learns from a six-month-old infant." (TAS: "The Eye of the Beholder")
Deanna Troi compared the newly formed emergent lifeform aboard the USS Enterprise-D to an infant, "acting on impulse, trying to figure itself out as it goes. The only source of experience it can draw on is ours though." (TNG: "Emergence")
Development[]
On the negative universe planet Arret, where time flowed in reverse, an individual was born at an old age and died in infancy. Following their experience in that universe, the crew of the USS Enterprise began to reverse in age, with much of the crew reaching infancy. (TAS: "The Counter-Clock Incident")
Due to being genetically-engineered, Jem'Hadar passed through infancy in a matter of hours. In most other respects, Jem'Hadar infants had the same limited abilities found in infants of other races. (DS9: "The Abandoned")
A specific future Borg drone, named One, also developed at an advanced rate, growing from infant to adult in the period of one day. (VOY: "Drone")
According to Tuvok, Vulcans used a device called a "pleenok" for training their infants in "primary logic." (VOY: "Human Error")
Baby paraphernalia and practices[]
- Baby booties
- Baby bottle
- Baby carriage
- Baby mobile
- Baby shower
- Babysitting
- Bassinet
- Bonnet
- Cradleboard
- Crib
- Diaper
- Incubator
- Lullaby
- Nursery
- Nursery school
- Playpen
- Rattle
- Thumbsucking
- Toy