Lecture 4: Conceptual Development Flashcards
How might children categorise objects?
There are a number of different possibilities:
Taxonomic categorisation (i.e. an ordered arrangement of groups or categories in a hierarchy)
Perceptual categorisation (i.e. based on perceptual features - colour, shape)
Thematic categorisation (i.e. based on themes – what would the object “go with”?
->A football might be associated with a t-shirt the child wears to play sports)
Conceptual organisation
- concepts are organised in hierachically
- basic level: dog, cat, chair, cow, tree
- global (superordinate) category: furniture and animal
- > more difficult, ask furniture word think of basic level concept
- hierarchical organisation of concepts
- > global level then basic level
Three hypotheses of conceptual development
Hypothesis 1
Development involves first acquiring basic level categories, then global/superordinate categories can be constructed (Rosch, 1978)
Hypothesis 2
Basic level and global/superordinate categories develop together
Hypothesis 3
Global/superordinate categories develop before basic level categories
Which is more likely?
-we chose hypothesis 1
How can we research young children?
Infants and toddlers can be tested in different ways
depending on their age:
Match to sample (around 2 years) (target and choose between options)
Sequential touching (around 12 months)
Tactual exploration and novelty preference (around 11
months)
Preferential looking (2+ months)
Match to sample task
Bauer & Mandler (1989) were interested in how young children organised the concepts that they hold.
They tested 1- and 2-year olds (using the match-to-sample task)
The purpose of the experiment was to see whether children were able to match based on basic-level AND superordinate level (i.e. can they match a dog with a dog (basic level) and also a chair with a bed (superordinate)).
- basic level: see this one? can you find another one just like this one? (lion picture)
- global/superordinate match: see this one? can you find another one just like this one? (monkey, choice between banana (thematic) or bear (categorical)
- > choosing bear correct as categorical match
Results:
- not much difference between basic and global at 19 months, 25 months and 31 months
- wasn’t an age effect
- > suggest that children might forget variable instructions??? (look study can’t understand prof)
Sequential touching as a measure of categorisation level
-Mandler and Bauer 1988
Sequential touching task:
Given a set of small objects, infants tend to touch objects sequentially
Infants touch objects from the same category in sequence more than chance
Systematic touching in the first year is followed by sorting the in the second year
-basic view in literature that basic formed first then subordinate
- different toys
- basic: dogs and cars
- superordinate: animals and modes of transportation
What did they find? 12 & 15 months: Basic level Sequential touching for dogs v cars Random touching for vehicles v animals 20 months: Global/Superordinate as well Sequential touching for both sets
Do infants use knowledge to identify global/superordinate categories?
- Pauen 2002
- hypothesis: (look at study can’t understand prof)
- wanted to see whether perceptual categorisation or based on knowledge
Realistic looking animals and furniture
11-month-old infants given sequence of objects to examine (either animals or furniture)
Test object was novel and from either the same or a different category
Infants examined the new-category object for longer than the familiar category object
This could be evidence for superordinate categories, or it could be based on simple perceptual differences (e.g. materials)
artificial looking animals and furniture (all look more perceptually similar)
Repeated with new sets made from artificial materials
Perceptual differences between sets reduced
If perceptual differences are important, infants should find this discrimination much more difficult
Results were exactly the same – longer examining of object from new category
Infants used pre-existing knowledge of categories to guide their examining
What about very young infants?
- Quinn and Johnson 2000
- 2-month-old infants familiarised to pictures of 16 different mammals
- Significant preference (59.8%) for furniture picture (global category)
- wanted to test the three hypothesises (which first or at same time)
- familiarize with animals, then presents with picture from same category or different
- infants look longer at the chair
- > shows able to do global categorisation as chair novel
- > habituated to mammals
2-month-old infants familiarised to pictures of 16 different cats
- then showed dog and cat pictures
- No preference (47.6%) for dog picture (basic
category) at 2 months, but sig. preference (63.6%) at 3 months - global form before basic level in this experiment
Protypes
-can infants learn prototypes?
- prototypes: good examples of category
- > have prototype in head and helps us to categorise
- Younger and Gotieb 1988
- habituation study
- dots forming shapes/lines
- prototype, then presented distortions (low to high)
- then presented another???
->seem to be familiar with prototype
(can’t understand prof look at article)
Do category preferences change with age?
-Blanchet et al. 2001
-picture of a cat
-thematic match: milk
-basic match: another cat
-superordinate match: dog
Early development of basic-level categories may promote deeper understanding of links between things
Target picture: Dog 1
“Can you find another picture that goes with this one?”
Alternatives: Dog 2 Bone Pen
Basic-level match: Dog 2 (same category)
Thematic match: Bone
3-year olds classified more with basic-level categories
4-year-olds preferred thematic relations (involves knowledge)
What does this suggest?
-thematic relations involved application of knowledge
->could be younger don’t have as much knowledge
->or could be processing
Biological Knowledge
example of distinction between animate and inanimate being fundamental to human experience
A key distinction is between biological and non-biological (animate vs. inanimate)
The man who mistook his wife for a hat had lost the ability to identify the animate
Biological motion
‘Biological motion’ is the term used to describe the unique way that an animate object moves.
Biological motion is commonly portrayed using ‘point light displays’, where white dots are placed at key
places on the body and recorded while an individual performs an action.
- infants able to identify biological motion but not when its inverted
- > couldn’t discriminate between inverted dots and random dots (bertenthal et al 1985)
How well do infants understand intentions?
-Meltzoff 1995
18-month-olds watched experimenter model 5 actions
4 groups
Demonstration (target): specific target acts (dumbell pulled apart)
Demonstration (intention): target acts not demonstrated, experimenter failed
Control (baseline): no demonstration
Control (manipulation): no demonstration, but experimenter handled objects
big difference between demonstration and control (20ish % vs 80ish%)
-infants able to understand intentions of adult
Do infants imitate actions for inanimate objects as well?
- Meltzoff 1995
- human demonstrator and mechanical device mimicking these movements (two different conditions)
- is this specific to humans?
- can they recognise intention with machine?
Human attempt: 60% pull dumbbell apart
Machine attempt: 10% pull dumbbell apart
Infants were significantly more likely to pull the dumbbell apart when they watched the human than when they watched the machine (p
Goal directed actions
- woodward et al. 2009
- bear and ladybug, hand grasping bear
- constantly inferring behaviour of others
- saw over and over bear and hand grasping
- then presented with new trial
- > new goal trial goes for lady bug
- > new side trial goes for bear but on different side
- 5 months: new goal more of a response?? surprised going for ball
- > means have to infer something about intention
- > with claw results same, only human arm infer
Can 11 month old infants predict the outcome of human actions?
- Cannon and Woodward 2012
- eyetracking
- see which one child looks at more
- hand and claw
- ball or frog
- Where will the hand or claw go?
- familiarisation, swap and test
YES, INFANTS ARE MORE LIKELY TO PREDICT ACTIONS IN THE HUMAN CONDITION THAN IN THE CLAW CONDITION
- Eye tracker data showed more predictive looks to goal object in hand than in claw condition
- hand: looked at original goal object
- claw: looked at original place
Knowledge about true nature of living things and objects
-Gelman and wellman 1991
Children make judgements about the ‘insides’ and ‘outsides’ of objects
‘Insides’ are more important than ‘outsides’ for understanding the true nature of an object
Compare a person and a waxwork
‘Insides’ question
“Which has the same kinds of insides as x?”
‘Outsides question’
“Which looks most like x?”
target: pig
- piggy bank or dog
- then ask about outside what looks most like x?
- then ask which has the same kinds of insides as x?
Target Picture: Pig
Same outsides: Piggy-Bank
Same insides: Puppy
Both 3- and 4-year-olds performed better than chance
Older children were more accurate
3-year-olds – 58% correct
4-year-olds – 73% correct
Equal number of both types of error
Appearance: Pig & Piggy Bank have same insides
Internal properties: Pig & Puppy look similar
Young children have knowledge of some key differences between biological and non-biological things
Ability to distinguish insides and outsides didn’t develop
What developed was the ability to cope with conflict between insides and appearance
Piggy-bank: looks like the pig, but does not have pig insides
Suggests improved processing capacity and possibly executive function (inhibition) could explain these effects (production deficit)
Knowledge about growth
-animate vs inanimate
-It is the case that biological, animate things grow with
time and may change their appearance.
-Inanimate things do not grow with time, but may
change in appearance (e.g. knocks, scuffs, renovation)
-Rosengren et al. 1991
Beliefs about naturally occurring transformations were examined in children aged 3 to 6 years in four experiments.
Children were presented with baby animals and brand new artefacts. For each target, they were given two pictures – one picture was always the same size, and the other was either smaller or larger.
Children were asked “Which picture shows x after it’s been around for a very long time?”
1) artefacts ( stimulus set with same size and smaller and stimulus set with same size and bigger)
- asked which is same? new to old?
2) animals (stimulus set with same size and smaller and stimulus set with same size and bigger)
- baby to adult?
If children know animals grow and artefacts do not
Always choose same size artefact
Never choose smaller animal
- 3 y/o vs 5y/o
- older children know animals grow bigger and artefacts don’t
- younger children know animals grow bigger (more difficultly when animals smaller) but unsure about artefacts (were just as likely to say grew as stay the same)
Principle of growth is first understood in the biological domain
Artefacts are less well understood at younger ages
Another characteristic feature of artefacts is that they are designed
This ‘design stance’ guides our judgements about category membership
It also promotes tool use
Young children do not have a concept of design
Artefacts and the concept of design
-3 experiments
-German and Johnson 2002
How do people identify and reason about object functions? How do they decide what objects such as cars, clocks, and cradles are for?
Therefore, as an object was intentionally designed to serve a specific function, we would expect people to retain the original name and function.
Test this idea by asking children about objects that change
Name (category)
Function
(split up instead having together)
Category: A long time ago an inventor made this thing and called it a ‘tog’, but now someone else owns it and he calls it a ‘fep’. What is it really, a tog or a fep?
Function: This is a ‘tog’. A long time ago an inventor made it for collecting leaves, but now it belongs to someone else. One day, he used it for catching fish.
What is it really for, collecting leaves, or catching fish?
-adults vs 5 y/o
- Children know that the original category (name) cannot change
But they don’t think that objects have a designed function
- looking to choose original
- adults high score
- 5 y/o do well in categorisation but not function (no difference)
Defeyter et al 2007
Brick
Novel functions: door stop ect
Design functions: build house
-5 y/o generate more novel functions, 7 y/o generate more design funstions
Could be a simple explanation, i.e. that older children have more experience with these objects.
- repeat experiments with novel objects and novel functions
- > a wiz for making holes in paper, a bif for rolling out play-doh
- same results
- 7 y/o thought of twice as many design functions, 5 y/o more likely to develop novel functions
->something greater than knowledge
Functional fixedness in Duncker’s candle problem
- matches, box of tacks and candle
- task to mount candle on the front of an wall, standing upright and illuminate room
- tack box to wall and put candle inside
- if presented pins outside box more likely to come up with a solution
- pins inside box, fixate function in head
Novel objects
-baseline vs function demonstration
- Defeyer and German 2003
- baseline: no comment on purpose, solve task without
- function demonstration: stick for making light (new function)
- > if people came up with novel way to use stick then more likely to solve then if fixated on fact used to make light
- 5, 6 and 7 y/o
- slower solutions in older children, aka functional fixedness effect at older age
Younger children do not have a concept of design and can think of novel uses for artefacts
They are immune to functional fixedness, and easily find a novel solution
Older children are constrained by their concept of design, and take longer to set aside the function and think of a novel one
However, there are many advantages to a design concept:
Simplifies use of artefacts
Able to immediately identify the function
Don’t have to select the function from the range of possibilities
