Exam 2 lecture notes Flashcards
infant learning
- habituation
- perceptual learning
- statistical learning
- classical conditioning
- instrumental conditioning
- observational learning
habituation
- infants tend to respond less to a stimulus they have already experienced
- e.g. looking time measures
- can be done with hearing as well
- basic phenomenon that we can experience: stare at image and then look at white paper- see inverse of that image.
- eating same snack for awhile- no longer tastes as good
- if our brains didnt habituate our brain could like melt and explode from too much excitement- transformer movies
Perceptual learning
- differentiation and affordances
- by 3.5 months, infants learnt hat their mother’s face goes with her voice
- idea that we learn from being perceivers of the world
- as we see things, we begin to form expectations as to what these things are.
- Affordances: learning that your mothers face goes with her voice
o These things go together / expectations that these things go together
o Angry voice goes with an angry face - Differentiation: kid learns that you can pick up a cup and pour things out of it
o Cup vs. mug vs. bowl
o Might learn that if it has a handle, it’s a mug, has a nipple it’s a bottle
o Can differentiate between things they have seen and haven’t seen
statistical learning
- infants learn the statistical regularity of events
- 8-month-olds can learn a novel language in 2 minutes, just from word transition probability
- 2-8 month old’s look longer at shape sequences that appear in a different sequence from a sequence they were original shown
- Children thrive off having a predictable
classical conditioning
- ## associating an unlearned stimulus with one that yields a response
instrumental conditioning
- learning basic consequences of behaviour
- positive reinforcement and contingency
- learnable by 2 months
- the younger the infant, the closer together the response and reinforcement need to be for learning
- negative consequences- infant may learn lack of control over their own environment
observational learning
- newborns imitate tongue-sticking out
- by 6 months, imitate specific behaviours
Jean Piaget
- sensorimotor
- preoperational
- concrete operational
- formal operational
Assimilation
new experiences incorporated into a child’s existing schema
accommodation
child’s theories are modified based on experience
Sensorimotor
birth-2 years - huge variety of new sensory experiences - core facets of intelligence expressed through experimentation with developing motor faculties examples: - tracking objects visually - grasping objects near hands - placing objects in mouth - turning head towards sounds
sensorimotor
- object permanence
objects continue to exist regardless of whether we continue to see them or not
preoperational
2years-7years
- interaction with world not limited to physical movements
- development of symbolic representations
preoperational
- centration
focusing on a single feature among many when making decisions about objects
preoperational
- egocentrism
- difficulty in perceiving the world from another’s point of view.
concrete operational
7-12 years
- more likely to consider multiple dimensions/povs
- difficulty with abstract reasoning and hypotheticals
formal operational years
12 years- ????
- able to think abstractly and reason hypothetically
caveats to piaget
- children’s mental strategies do not generalize across problem types within a given stage
- infant struggles with object permanence may be overstated by measurement technique
- underestimates impact of the social word
- doesn’t explain the underlying cognitive processes or mechanisms of change
Beyond the Piagetian
- information processing
- core knowledge
- sociocultural
- dynamic systems
information processing
- child as limited-capacity processing system
- multiple memory systems subserved by multiple disparte regions of the brain
- working memory- severe capacity limit) —> 3/4 items
sources of variability
- encoding and retrieval
- strategy use
- speed of processing
- selective attention
- content knowledge
core knowledge
- children must have specialized language learning mechanisms to grasp the immense
dynamic systems
- development does not occur in a bubble
- each developmental changes impacts the way a child interfaces with their environment
- crucial to consider with the acquisition of new skills in development
nativist view
nature/ nurture
nature
- children are born with innate knowledge
- grammar, objects, time and space, causality, number and the human mind
- children have specialized learning mechanisms to acquire this knowledge quickly
nurture
- experiences shape knowledge beyond the initial level that all children are born with
- but initial knowledge is present at birth
Empiricist view
nature/ nurture
Nature
- children are born with general learning mechanisms to acquire knowledge
- ability to perceive, make associations between objects, generalize, remember
nurture
- exposure to different experiences results in knowledge about various topics
- grammar, time and space, causality, number and the human mind
perceptual categorization
- grouping objects with similar appearance
- by 3-4 months, infants categorize along numerous dimensions- color, shape, size, movement
- may also categorize based on the prominent feature or function- presence/absence of legs
categorical hierarchies
- social environment critical for refining categories
- an infant might not think these are all the same animal, but if they lived with these animals they would see common features amongst them- barking, tail wagging
- children use cause and effect to make categories
- 4-5 year olds told about features of wugs and gillies
Native psychology
- an understanding of other people and oneself
- major developments in infancy
- joint attention
- intentionality
- understanding others emotions
nativists vs empiricists
nativists: children born with intrinsic understanding of human psychology
empiricists: experiences with other people and processing capacities influence how we understand others’ actions
theory of mind (ToM)
- basic understanding of how the mind works and how it influences behaviour (desires, beliefs, emotions)
- by 12 months, connection between desires and actions
- by 2 years, cant yet connect beliefs with actions
- by 3 years, can connect beliefs and actions- yet still struggle with false-belief problems (performance improves up to ~5 years)
theory of mind (ToM)
Nativist/ Empiricist
nativist - theory of mind module develops in 1st 5 years- amygdala and brainstem atypical in Autism
Empiricist
- more interaction and experiences with others
- children with siblings develop ToM earlier
- particularly if older siblings of opposite sex
- increased general processing skills
- improved complex reasoning
- ability to inhibit one’s own reactions
Imaginary friends
- 63% of children report imaginary friends at 3-4 years, 7-8 years, or both
- —- 30% of children 3-7 years
- characteristics of kids with imaginary friends
- —- more likely to be first born or only-children
- —- watch relatively little TV
- —- verbally skillful
- —- advanced theory of mind
Egocentric representations
Coding of object location relative to self without regard to surroundings
Self-locomotion improves understanding of space beyond one’s self
Use of landmarks helps navigating through space
Development of spatial skills depends on cultural importance
By ~12 months, infants can
replicate
the order of events shown in a series of two pictures
By ~20 months, toddlers can replicate
the order of events shown in a series of three pictures
First, middle, last
Sense of duration by ~4 months
Habituated to 5 seconds of light, 5 seconds of darkness
Heart-rate changes observed .5 seconds before light went off
- Preschoolers can discriminate longer intervals (weeks, months)
- Precision with time discrimination continues to develop into middle childhood
Development of past/future concepts by
~6 years of age Likely related to class experiences
Children experience passage of time illusions like adults
Attending closely to time passing — seems longer
Being very busy — shorter
Children rely on causality to
understand why
physical and psychological events occur
Taking apart toys; flipping lights
Children and adults have better understanding of
psychological than physical causality
- We can tell you how someone decides to change the channel better than we can describe how the remote works
Children have higher recall for events with
causal relationship
9-11 months will only reproduce actions with causal relationship
By 20-22 months, will replicate unrelated sequences
Preschoolers expect consistency in cause-effect relationships
If petting dog, should wag tail
If dog growls, not b/c petting
Magic tricks start to become interesting by
~5 years
Understanding of numeracy varies by culture and language
Infants understand numerical equality by 5-6 months
Recognize similar quantities
At least for small numbers (1-3)
Working Memory capacity also severely limited (1-3 items)…
Young infants (6 mos.) can discriminate between sets of numbers with 2:1 ratio
If numbers are large 16 vs. 8 Not 4 vs. 2 But not 1.5:1 ratio.. More precise with age
Counting
By age 3, most children can count to 10
Preschoolers understand counting principles
counting principles
- 1-to-1 correspondence — each object can only have a single numbered label
- Stable order — recited in same order
- Cardinality — number = last of the set
- Order irrelevance — when counting
- Abstraction — anything can be counted
Culture & Numeracy
Differences in number systems across cultures impact the rate at which children learn
Also, differences in emphasis on number skills
General Intelligence
g
- Aspect of intelligence that is tapped into whenever intelligence is measured
General Intelligence Influences ability to think & learn
Correlated with:
Academic performance
Speed of processing
Speed of brain functions
Brain volume
Fluid Intelligence
gf
Ability to think & problem-solve in the moment
Correlated with: Ability to learn Speed of processing Working memory capacity Attentional control Size of the cortex Prefrontal & parietal functions during attention and problem- solving tasks
Crystallized Intelligence
gc Factual knowledge about the world Reflects long-term memory Vocabulary Math facts Periodic table Closely related to language ability Hippocampus crucial to Gc
Three-StratumTheory
g
Moderately general abilities
Specific processes
Hierarchical model (Carroll, 1993; 2005)
g influences all moderately general abilities
g and moderately general abilities influence specific processes
Conclusion: intelligence involves all three levels
Intelligence is likely one, a few, and many factors all together
Controversies
Intelligence Tests
Pros:
Better than alternatives at predicting outcomes
Valuable for deciding about special education needs
Cons
Doesn’t capture the complexity of intelligence
Tests are culturally biased
Reducing one’s intelligence to a single number is over-simplified and ethically questionable
SES Influence on IQ
Potential factors:
Nutrition, health care, parenting, intellectual stimulation, emotional support, stress levels
Greater societal inequality — greater difference between lower and higher SES outcomes
Societal Influence on IQ
Average IQ has risen
over the past 75 years
~10 pts in the US; ~20 pts in Netherlands
Largest change in lowest IQ scores
Better health care, nutrition, & education reduces disparities
Countries with high equality — fewest changes in IQ scores
Risk Factors & IQ
- Unemployed parents
- Mother didn’t complete high school
- 4+ children in home
- No father/stepfather
- Maternal anxiety or mental health
- Negative mother-child interactions
Intelligence Tests
Tasks change over time
Tasks adequately assessing intelligence at one age may not be appropriate for other ages
Language questions not utilized until children typically have language skills
Intelligence tests
Most effects observed
after 5-6 years old
WISC-IV
Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children 4th ed.
Reflects Carroll’s three-stratum theory
Provides an overall score and separate scores for moderately general abilities
“Make the blocks on the right look like the picture on the left”
Intelligence Quotient (IQ)
Overall measure relative to same-aged children
Based on a normative distribution
68% of scores fall between 85-115 IQ
95% of scores fall between 70-130 IQ
- mean 100
- md 15
Intelligence Quotient (IQ) - Highly stable over time
Scores across time highly correlated
Intelligence Quotient (IQ) - Changes occur due to
Randomness
- Alertness on testing days
- Knowledge of specific items
Environmental factors
- Change in household make up
- Change in neighborhood
IQ shown to predict:
Academic outcomes -School success -Long-term achievement Achievement test scores Occupational success
Intelligence Quotient (IQ)
As a predictive factor
- relevant factors
Self-discipline — ability to inhibit actions, follow rules, avoid impulsive reactions
Practical Intelligence — ability to read other’s emotions, intentions, etc.
Childhood environment
Genetic Influences on IQ
Correlations b/w genes & IQ increase with age
- Likely because aspects of genetic influence realized in adolescence (Brain development)
- With age, children interact more with their own interests
Passive effects of genotype
effects due to overlap between parent and child genotypes
Evocative effects of genotype
effects due to children’s influence on other’s behavior
Active effects of genotype
effects due to a child choosing an environment that they enjoy
Family Influence on IQ
Household environment correlates highly with IQ
- BUT…parents & children also share genes
Environment accounts for higher degree of variability in IQ than genetics in children from lower SES households
- Opposite pattern seen in higher SES children
School Influence on IQ
IQ increases with greater academic experience
- Children in higher grades have higher IQ scores, even if they are the same age
IQ scores are higher during the school year than they are during the summer
- Especially in lower SES children
- Comparable intellectual stimulation during the school year, but reduces with SES in summer
What is Language?
The use of sights, sounds, signs, and symbols with the intention of communication and/or self-expression
- Human language: symbolic, grammatical, generative
Comprehension
Production
Comprehension
Understanding what others say, sign, or write
Production
Speaking, signing, or
writing to others
Generativity
Use of a finite set of word to create (generate) an infinite array of sentences or express an infinite array of ideas
Language Localization
Language processing highly localized in the brain
Hemispheric:
In most right-handers — left hemisphere
In 10-15% of left-handers — right hemisphere
Specific aspects localized within left hemisphere
Broca’s area: speech production (fluency)
Wernicke’s area: language comprehension
Sensitive Periods
aka critical periods
- After certain periods in development, it is very difficult to achieve native-like language processing
Different aspects have different sensitive periods
Phonology
Grammar
Semantics
Within first 9 months
Werker & colleagues
Grammar
Within first 3 years
Neville & colleagues
Semantics
Learnable throughout life
Neville & colleagues
Infant-Directed Speech
Motherese” occurs in almost all cultures
Emotional tone (often described as “sweet”)
Exaggerated vocal pitch
Exaggerated prosody
Slower rate of speech (& longer pause time)
Often exaggerated facial expressions
language aspects
- phonology
- morphology
- semantics
Phonology
- Phoneneme
Phoneme: small unit of sound with meaning
- English has ~34 distinct sounds (<45)
- Different sounds made by moving lips, jaw, tongue, vocal folds, & larynx
Combine phonemes to create morphemes
(aka words
Stages of Babbling
Stage 1 — 0 to 8 weeks
Reflexive crying & vegetative sounds
- Cry, burp, cough, sneeze
- Larynx high in neck; tongue fills oral cavity
- Allows infants to breathe & swallow simultaneously, but difficult to make sounds
Stages of Babbling
Stage 2 — 8 to 20 weeks
Cooing & laughter
- Pleasant sounds, especially during social interactions — mostly vowels (“oooooh”)
- Crying becomes more a sign of distress
- Sustained laughter begins
Stages of Babbling
Stage 3 — 16 to 30 weeks
Vocal play
- Transition from cooing to true babbling
- Begin to utter single syllables (i.e., ba, ga)
- Vowels and consonant sounds
Stages of Babbling
Stage 4 — 25 to 50 weeks
Reduplicated babbling
- “True” babbling appears (“mamamama”)
- CV patterns repeated with pitch variations
- Both in social setting and when alone
Stages of Babbling
Stage 5 — 9 to 18 months — Jargon
- Variegated babbling (non-repeated CV syllables — “badayaga”)
- Sounds as though infant is carrying on conversation (pitch change, intonation, etc.)
Can congenitally deaf babies babble?
Go through the first 3 stages
But do not engage in reduplicated babbling
No auditory experience — no vocal babbling
BUT manual babbling if exposed to ASL early
“1” and “OK” (Petitto & Marentette, 1991)
Suggests speech production before 6 months is not experience based (but after..)
Phonology: Development
Sound development continues until ~8-9 years
By 2 years old: produce 10-20 consonants
By 6 years old: mostly vowels & consonants
By 9 years old: can produce all sounds of their language correctly (~75% of the time)
Phonology: Awareness
Around preschool-age, realization that words are made of individual sounds
- Early literacy skills predicted by ability to:
- Recognize syllables
- Recognize word-initial sounds (/k/ in “cat”)
- Learning to rhyme
- Identifying individual phonemes
Morphology
Morpheme: small language unit w/ meaning
Cannot be divided
Often appear in many different words
Use is rule-based
Free morphemes — stand alone
ex: fire, dog, grass
Bound morphemes — cannot stand alone
ex: a-, un-, -s, -ed, -ness
Morphology:: Development
Children apply morphological rules widely
…and often incorrectly.
Overgeneralization errors
Begin around ~20 months; last until ~5 years
Joint attention
- critical for communication
- early, child establishes while adult comments
- ~6 months: infants follow adults gaze
- ~ 9 months: infants follow adults pointing
- ~ 11-12 months: infants can point themselves
- +2 years: infants intentionally direct attention
semantics
- meaning of words and the ways words relate
- largely focused on vocabulary acquisition
one of the first words learned
- childs own name
- many children recognize by ~4.5 months
- may help children attend to other words
ex, “thats tommy’s spoon”
infant directed speech makes it easier
for children to identify word boundaries
semantics: comprehension
- begins at ~8-10 months
- starts with responding to basic commands
- gestures important to vocabulary acquisition
semantics: production
- occurs after comprehension
- first word typically at ~1 year
- – requires knowledge of word + ability to produce in a way that an adult understands
- predominatly noun s
- learn 8-11 new words per month
- know ~50 words by 18 months
semantics vocabulary spurt
- rapid growth in vocabulary knowledge and learning from ~18 months to 6 years
- 22-37 new words/month
- typically learning nouns (people, toys, foods)
- also, social interaction words (Hi, Bye)
semantics: human speechome project
- overtime, child does more of the speaking
- input frequency of particular words associated with the age of acquisition for those words
- Caregivers tended to use words in shorter sentences as the child learned that word
•Mean utterance length decreased before word appeared in child’s vocabulary
Semantics: Human speechome project
Although vocabulary grows over lifespan, rate of growth peaked around 20 months
•Remember, N=1
Child comprehension is better than
production
Semantics
by 6 years..
Can produce ~6000 words
•Can understand ~14,000 words
Semantics
30 million word gap
High-income children exposed to 30 million more words by age 3 than children living in poverty
•Predicts vocab & literacy @ age 9
“30 million word gap”
semantics
speechome Project: Autism & Verb Tense Usage
Extend methods of original Speechome study to more children
- SImilar usage of verb tense.
- Audrey as productive, if not more so, with usage of verb tense.
- Audrey use of verb tense markers less consistent than Cleo’s.
- Typical development of future constructions such as “will ____” and “going to _____”but higher production of “I”m a ____”.
Semantics: learning errors
Overextensions
Underextensions
•Overextensions •Stretching a word beyond correct meaning
•Boundary for a category is too broad
•“doggie” — any 4-legged creature
: Learning Errors
- Underextensions •A specific object possesses the category label, and others within category must have a different label
- Boundary for a category is too narrow
- My cat is a “cat” — but all other cats must be something else
Semantics: mutual exclusivity
•Each category should have only one label
•Nouns result in mutually exclusive categories
: Mutual Exclusivity
Child assume label refers to the whole object
•“Whole Object Assumption” (Markman et al., 1989; 1998)
•Nouns result in mutually exclusive categories
Semantics: social referencing
- Children learn a word when the speaker refers to a specific object (Baldwin, 1993)
- Reference between gaze at an object and use of the label improves learning
semantics: interntionality
•Children assume adults act with intention
•Learn labels that adults use intentionally
•Also use emotionality and emotional cues
: Intentionality
Semantics: “synaptic bootstrappin”
Use of grammar to deduce word meaning
“This is my dax.”
“This is a dax one.”
“This is daxish.”
Semantics: Prior knowledge
- Children more easily learn a word if it fits with words they already know
- Occurs more at older ages (preschool)
Syntax
- The structure or grammatical rules of language
* How words are combined into a sentence
Holophrases
one word sentence •Combined with gesture to convey meaning •“Juice” — •“I want some juice!” •“This is juice.” •“I like juice.”
Telegraphic speech
- Utterances that leave out the “little words”
- Includes content/open-class words
- Nouns, verbs
- Omits the function/closed-class words
- Of, the, a, and
- Begins with two-word utterances
- “See doggie!”
- Still seen with longer utterances
- “Daddy give me milk!”
syntax: development
- Production of more complex sentences begins around 2-2.5 years old
- Starting to put 4 or more words together
- “Look at me hit the ball.”
- Begin connecting ideas with “and” at ~3 years
- Most children use complex sentences by 4 yrs
- Linking main and subordinate clauses using “if”, “because”, “until”, “while”, etc.
Syntax largely developed by
~5 years
•Some development continues into school-age
•Subject-verb agreement (They was/were)
•Personal pronouns (He/Him went)
grammar generally adult-like at
6-7 years
Young children
•Collective speech
series of monologues
•Lack of turn-taking; unrelated statements
By ~5 years of age
•Narratives
- scaffolding
- Narratives: description of events like story
* Scaffolding: added structure to child speech and memory provided by parents
