Infancy

Question 1

Change can be…

Answer 1

• Gradual (growth of muscles)
• Make new structures appear (facial hair)
• Driven by a genetic program
• Driven by environmental conditions

Question 2

Competence and performance

Answer 2

Competence: having the ability to do something in principle.

Performance: what you can actually observe.

“Performance factors” (e.g. memory limitations. immature motor control etc.) might limit how much of the underlying abilities are observable.

Question 3

Object permanance at 3 months (case study):

Answer 3

Object permanance is the ability to understand that even if an object is no longer visible, it continues to exist.

Infants under 8 to 9 months will not search for a hidden object, suggesting they lack object permanence (Piaget & Inhelder, 1969).

Question 4

Theory of mind (case study):

Answer 4

• Max puts his chocolate in the green cupboard… Max goes to the playground… Mothertransfers the chocolate from the green to blue cupboard while max is away… Mother goes out into the garden… Max comes back home for his chocolate… So where will Max look for his chocolate?*
• > Children fail at this location change false belief test before the age of 4 (Wimmer & Perner, 1983), suggesting that they have no Theory of Mind.

In the false belief tasks, children have to inhibit their own beliefs to provide the correct answer. Inhibition requires executive functions, which arenotoriously immature in infancy.

Question 5

Search onset and the A not B error:

Answer 5

• By 9 months, if an object is hidden an infant will search for it successfully. To Piaget this indicated the beginnings of the ability to represent the unseen object.
• Piaget complicated the task to test the extent of the infants ability