Baillargeon's explanation of infant abilities Flashcards
what did Baillargeon suggest?
That babies have a better understanding of the physical world (unlike Piaget - links to object permanence - that babies would lose interest in an object when it was out of sight)
She proposed that the lack of understanding of object permanent could be explained differently
e.g. babies may lack necessary motor skills to pursue hidden object, or may lose interest as they are easily distracted
What is the violation of expectation in Baillargeon’s study?
VOE as follows ‘in a typical experiment, [babies] see two test events, an unexpected event, which is consistent with the expectation examined in the experiment, and an unexpected event - which violates this expectation’
is the VOE used to measure object permanence, infants will typically see two conditions, in which the object pass in and out of sight.
explain the procedure of the VOE experiment?
Baillargeon worked with Graber
they showed 24 babies (aged 5-6 months) a tall and short rabbit passing behind a screen with a window
in the familiarisation event, baby is shown a short and tall rabbit disappearing as they pass behind a screen - which fits our expectations of object permanence
test event - there are 2 conditions - one expected event where a short rabbit now passes behind a screen with a window, and because of the height of the window, the short rabbit is not visible until it appears on the other side.
in the second condition, the unexpected event - the tall rabbit would not be seen through the window as it moves from one side of the screen to another
A baby who has object permanence should show surprise when shown the unexpected event
what were the findings?
the babies looked for an average of 33.07 secs at unexpected event, compared to 25.11 secs at the expected event
researchers suggested this means the babies were surprised at the unexpected condition
to be surprised suggests they must have known that the tall rabbit should have reappeared at the window
this demonstrates a good understanding of object permanence
What are some other studies?
Baillargeon and Graber study is an example of occlusion study - one object occludes another (i.e. is in front of it0
VOE experiments have also been used to test infant understanding of containment and support
‘containment’ idea that when an object is seen to enter a contained, it should still be there when the container is opened
‘support’ is the idea that the object should fall when unsupported but not when it is on a horizontal surface -
in all these cases, infants have shown that they pay more attention to unexpected events, so appear to have a good understanding of the physical world (Hespos and Baillargeon)
what did Baillargeon suggest about physical reasoning?
that humans are born with a physical reasoning system - hardwired with basic understanding of the physical world and ability to learn more details easily
initially we have primitive awareness of the physical properties of the world and this becomes more detailed from experience
object persistence is an aspect of the world which we have a crude understanding from birth - kind of similar to Piaget’s object permanence (that an object remains in existence and doesn’t alter in structure)
How does the theory of infant physical reasoning develop in babies?
first few weeks, babies begin to identify event categories, each event category corresponds to one way in which objects interact
e.g. occlusion events take place when one object blocks view of another
Babies are born with a basic understanding that objects continue to exist even when out of sight and quickly learn that one object can block their view of another. By the time they take part in tasks like Baillargeon and Graber’s VOE (e.g., the tall and short rabbit experiment), they already expect the tall rabbit to appear in the window.
The ‘unexpected’ event grabs their attention because their innate PRS (physical reasoning system) makes them naturally curious about new events that might help them learn more about how the physical world works.
Strength of Baillargeon’s research is validity of the VOE method
VOE method gets around one of the limitations that Piaget’s research had - his assumption that when baby loses interest in hidden object, they no longer believe it exists
Piaget’s method of studying cannot distinguish between this and the alternative possibility that the baby simply became distracted by other visual stimuli - so stopped looking in the original place.
VOE method overcomes this because ‘distraction’ would not affect the outcome - in the VOE, the only thing measured is how long baby looks at the visual scene - looking away from the scene would not be recorded
means that Baillargeon’s VOE method has greater validity than Piaget’s because a confounding variable is controlled.
also provide support for her theory explaining early cognitive development
counterpoint:
Piaget pointed out that acting in accordance with a principle is not the same as understanding it (Bremner)
Just because babies notice and focus more on unexpected events doesn’t necessarily mean they understand them - true understanding involves being able to consciously think about something and apply it to different situations
means that even though babies react to unexpected events, it may not indicate a real change in their cognitive abilities
Limitation of Baillargeon’s research - the assumption that response to VOE is linked to unexpectedness and so object permanence
Piaget suggested that babies respond to an unexpected event but that this does not mean they truly understand it
a methodological issue is that babies’ response may not even be to the unexpectedness of the event.
All of VOE shows is the babies find certain events more interesting - we are inferring a link between this response and object permanence
actually although the different length of time spent looking at two different events may well reflect one being more interesting than the other - so may not be because the baby sees it as unexpected
- could be more interesting
means that the VOE method may not be an entirely valid way to study a young child’s understanding of the physical world
Strength - of Baillargeon’s explanation is the ability to explain universal understanding of the physical world
Haspos and Marle point out we have very good understanding of the basic characteristics of the physical world - regardless of culture and personal experience
e.g. everyone understands that if we drop a key ring, it falls to the ground
this does not require past experience of dropping keys or even a culture that makes use of keys
the universal understanding suggest that a basic understanding of the physical world is innate. if it were not innate, we would expect significant cultural and individual differences and there is no evidence for these
this innate basic understanding of the physical world suggests that Baillargeon’s PRS is correct
extra - credibility:
there have been challenges to the ide of the PRS - not only is it difficult to determine whether a baby is really responding to the unexpected nature of an event, but even if the baby is, this may not indicate real understanding
but one thing that enhances the credibility of the PRS is its consistency with what we already know about the development of other visual systems
e.g., babies can use crude patterns to judge distance at an early age, but experience is needed to make use of more subtle visual cues
