Baillargeon Explanation of Early Infant Abilities

Question 1

Motives

Answer 1

. Infants more capable than Piaget thought - innately driven
. Object permenance tasks, infants didn’t search for objects because they can’t plan and execute the actions
^ led to VoE research

Question 2

Violation of Expectation research

Answer 2

. Infants will show surprise when witnessing impossible event
^ Know their expectations

Aim = investigate whether infants surprised at unusual event
. Measured object permanence by using disappearing/sliding doll
. If baby wasn’t surprised - don’t have object permanence
. Magical event = something that can’t logically happen
. Developed as early as 3 months

Question 2

Explaining infants innate knowledge

Answer 2

. Primitive awareness of physical world - more sophisticated from experience = physical reasoning system
. Born with basic understanding of object permanence, quickly learns object can block view of another
. Impossible events capture attention due to PRS

Question 2

Variables of VoE research
(Hespos and Baillargeon)

Answer 2

. Containment = object enter container - still be there when it opens
. Support = object should fall when not supported
. The ramp study

Question 3

Evaluation (Strengths)

Answer 3

. 2 blind observers for study
. Generalisability
. VoE better test of infant understanding than Piaget

Question 4

Evaluation (Limitations)

Answer 4

. Hard to judge what infants understand