Module 1: Infancy and the Physical World

Question 1

What were Jean Piagets and Henry James earlier theory on child development?

Answer 1

Historically famous developmental psychologists such as Jean Pigaet and Henry James were sckeptical of infants cognitive ability to process information in stimulus rich environments/

(A) Jean Pigaet:
- Jean believed that before 18 
  months of age infants 
  understanding of the world 
  was limited (i.e., they couldn’t 
  hold mental representations in 
  their mind or store 
  information/memories) to what 
  could be observed and acted 
  upon in the present moment.

(B) Henry James:
- Henry is known for his quote 
  “infants... feel it all as one great 
  blooming, buzzing, confusion”. 
  This reflected his belief that 
  infants were rudimentery 
  (guided by basic principles) in 
  their psychological 
  understanding of their physical 
  world that they were 
  constantly bombarded with 
  sensory information to the 
  point that they were not 
  capable of interpreting their 
  physical world.

Question 2

How do we describe infants’ early perceptual world of objects and events? Is it similar to adults’ perceptual capability?

How would we test this? by looking at ___

Why is studying ___ important?

Answer 2

by focusing on infants’ memory!

Why is studying infants’ memory important?

 We live in a very busy world 
  with lots of sensory 
  information to interpret which 
  requires time and effort to do. 
 To make this process easier 
  we need to be able to 
  encode and store what we 
  have seen before, so we are 
  able to interpret what is new 
  and develop higher order 
  concepts.
 i.e., we need good working 
  memory (short-term memory) 
  which gives us the ability to 
  store information over brief 
  periods of time for 
  manipulation.
 Example: 
o Where’s Wally is a visual 
  search task which requires 
  working memory to be able 
  to recall where you have 
  searched and what you’ve 
  seen in the past and use this 
  information to help you find 
  him now.

Question 3

what form of learning gives richer information to infants?

Answer 3

interactive rather than observational.

i.e.,
why their cognitive development becomes more sophisticated once they learn to self sit and interact with their physical world to learn about how objects ought to be.
i.e.,
why their memory of associations is longer for the mobile task relative to the defferred-imitation task.

Question 4

How do we test infants working memory capacity to recall information about their physical world?

Cornell (1979) 
> Logic,
> Steps,
> Results,
> Implications.

Answer 4

Cornell (1979)

 Conducted a study to test 
   the bounds of infants 
   working memory. They 
   exploited infants’(5–6- 
   month-old) preference to 
   pay attention to new things 
   (adaptive function to learn 
   new things; preference for 
   novelty) and used this to see 
   how they can store 
   information about objects.

Logic:
 If infants can remember 
   what they saw in the 
   learning phase of the 
   experiment than they should 
   express a novelty bias and 
   look longer at the new 
   image. However, if they 
   cannot recall what they saw 
   in the past then there should 
   be no significant difference 
   in looking across the two 
   stimuli and conditions.

Steps:

1. Learning Phase:
• Infants were habituated to a 
  pair of images of geometric 
  shapes (3 sets, for 20sec 
  each). This means they were 
  repeatedly exposed to the 
  images till the infant got 
  bored and stopped paying 
  attention to it.

2. Reminder Phase:
• Two days after the learning 
  phase infants were shown 
  one of the two images as a 
  reminder of the learning 
  phase.

3. Test Phase:
• This is a recognition test 
  where they were shown 
  either a familiar; familiar 
  pairing or a familiar; novel 
  pairing and their looking time 
  was compared between the 
  two conditions.

4. Results:
• They found that 5- and 6- 
  month-old infants showed a 
  novelty preference and 
  looked longer at the novel 
  image within the familiar; 
  novel pair.
• This implies that infants 5–6- 
  month old's have good 
  recognition and memory of 
  objects and can retain visual 
  information for at least 2 
  days.

*memory is not due to 
 reminder cue because the 
 control group who received a “reminder” cue without being 
 familiarized to some of the 
 stimuli did not show a novelty 
 preference.
*same effect with faces as 
  well.
*evidence of recognition 
 memory of objects in early 
 infancy

Question 5

Using Novelty Preference to Measure the Span of Working Memory in Infants.
i.e., how many items can infants hold in their working/short-term memory?

Rose et al. (2001)
> Logic
> Steps
> Side Notes
> Key Points

Answer 5

Rose et al. (2001)
Conducted a study to examine how many items infants can hold in their working memory as they developed. They tested the same infants at ages 5, 7 and 12 months to see if they’re able to hold up to 4 items in their working memory (short-term memory).

Steps:
1. Infants were familiarized
(habituated) to 4 items in
succession (one at a time).

2. Then infants were shown 
   each of the 4 items (old) but 
   each paired with a novelty 
   item. The researchers were 
   interested in whether, across 
   the 4 object pairs, did infants 
   spend more time looking at 
   the novel object?

3. They found that 5-month- 
   old infants had a working 
   memory span of 2 but by 12 
   months they had a working 
   memory span of 4 (i.e., it was 
   developing!). 

Notes: 
 Span of 1 = novelty 
   preference shown in only 
   one pair, Span 2 = novelty 
   preference seen in two pairs 
   so on and so forth...
 They tested for primacy and 
   recency effects.
 Working memory capacity 
   increased with age (i.e, 
   between five and seven 
   months only a few infants, 
   25%, could hold 3-4 items 
   simaltaneously in working 
   memory. By 12 months 
   almost 50% of infants could 
   hold 3-4 items in their 
   working memory).
 Recency effects found 
   across all three ages.
 No primacy effect was 
   reported but is probable.

Key Takeaway?
 This shows use that 
   exploiting “novelty 
   preference” and habituation 
   techniques we can provide 
   evidence that infants can 
   encode, store, and 
   manipulate visual 
   information about objects in 
   their physical world for 2 
   days and test the limitations 
   of their working memory 
   capacity.
 Working memory operates 
   similarly in infants as it does 
   in adults.

Question 6

Memory for Causal Events:
 Can infants remember that 
   objects are affected by our 
   actions (causal events; 
   cause-effect relationships)

Are infants able to
remember cause-effect
relationships? How do we
test this?

Answer 6

Are infants able to remember cause-effect relationships? How do we test this?
 Using tasks that teach 
   infants that an action 
   (kicking) causes a desirable 
   effect (spinning and sound).
 Then later testing to see if 
   the infant will engage in the 
   action to get the effect 
   (conditioned response).

Rovee-Collier & Hayne (1987)
Mobile-Kick Study

Steps: 
1. Baseline Phase:
   Where the infant has a 
   ribbon tied to their ankle 
   whilst in the crib. The 
   researchers keep a record of 
   how many times the infant 
   kicks their leg in the 
   absence of reinforcement 
   (i.e., the mobile moving).

2. Learning Phase:
   Immediately after baseline 
   the ribbon connected to 
   their foot is attached to the 
   mobile. Any kicking action 
   will move the mobile and 
   plays sounds, this acts as a 
   reinforcement for the 
   behaviour. Infants will learn 
   cause-effect relationship 
   between kick-mobile and 
   their kick rate will increase 
   (ABA design; baseline- 
   reinforcement-baseline). 

3. Long-Term Retention Phase:
   The researcher tests infant's 
   memory of the causal event 
   by testing the infant's 
   behavioural response when 
   place in the crib where the 
   ribbon is connected to an 
   empty stand (i.e., doesn’t 
   move) several days later. The 
   kick rate is compared to 
   baseline (if increases it 
   provides evidence of 
   working memory of causal 
   events! If below baseline no 
   memory of causal events to 
   days later).

Results: MAIN FINDINGS
 2-month-old infants are able 
   to remember causal events 
   (kick-mobile) up to 2 days.
 3-month-old infants are able 
   to remember causal events 
   (kick-mobile) up to 1 week.
 6-month-old infants are able 
   to remember causal events 
   (kick-mobile) up to 2 weeks.

*This provides evidence that 
  their ability to remember 
  causal events are present in 
   early infancy and their 
   working memory capacity 
   develops overtime.

Question 7

Can the Mobile task be conducted on older infants?

Answer 7

Can we use the SAME mobile experiment for older infants? 
 No. 
o But we can adapt it so older 
   infants sit up right on a chair 
   rather than lying down. Still 
   infants are testes to see if 
   they kick their legs to make 
   objects (toys: train move or 
   mobile spin) move.
 Results: 
o plotted on top of the mobile 
   task we see a clear age- 
   related pattern where the 
   older infants are the longer, 
   they can hold information 
   about causal events over 
   time.

Question 8

The Main Debate About Rovee-Collier & Hayne’s (1987) Findings?

Mobile Task?

Answer 8

The Main Debate About Rovee-Collier & Hayne’s (1987) Findings?

Procedural or Declative Memory?

 Do the findings of the mobile 
   task is reflect procedural 
   memory (implicit, automatic, 
   memories of how to perform 
   different actions or skills) or 
   declarative memory (explicit, 
   episodic memory which 
   involves bringing memories 
   into conscious awareness 
   and manipulating them).
   How do we determine if its 
   merely a reflexive action or 
   thought-out response?

 One way to test this is to 
   explore the boundaries of 
   the task and rule out other 
   factors that may influence 
   their performance.

Question 9

How do Rovee-Collier et al. (1992) address the debate around their findings on their mobile task?

describe the two follow studies they conducted

Answer 9

Does it work like adult memory? do changes to contextual and stimuli factors impair recall of explicit memory?

Rovee-Collier et al. (1992)
Changing the features of the stimuli between the learning and test phase.

Steps:
1. 3-month old infants were 
   trained on the kick-mobile 
   contingency with a mobile 
   that had blocks with the 
   letter L on them.
2. 24-hours later they were 
   tested to see if they would 
   kick to make the mobile spin 
   when the blocks were 
   changed from “L’s” to “X’s”
3. Results:
   Changing the features of the 
   stimuli disrupts infants recall 
   completely. Only when the 
   stimuli stays the same are 
   they able to recall the 
   contingency kick-mobile.

Logic: 
 If prelinguistic infants are 
   effected in the same way as 
   older primary school children 
   (approx. 6 years old) to 
   changes in stimuli than this 
   indicates that they have very 
   similar working memory 
   systems.
 Argument for prelinguistic 
   infants using explicit memory 
   rather than procedural!

Rovee-Collier et al. (1992)
Changing Features of Learning Context

Steps:
1. 3-month old infants were 
   trained on the kick-mobile 
   contingency in a crib with 
   stripes on it.
2. 24-hours later they were 
   tested to see if they would 
   kick to make the mobile spin 
   when they were placed in a 
   crib with polka dots on it.
3. Results:
- Infants were not able to recall 
  the kick-mobile causal 
  contingency!
- This indicates that specific 
  details of the environment 
  can act as retrival cues 
  (memory in early infancy is 
  context-specifc)
- From 9-months of age infants 
  memory becomes less 
  context specific. This 
  coincides with their 
  development of motor and 
  language skills that make 
  them more cognitively flexible 
  (interacting with objects, 
  language to communicate; 
  are less constrained by info 
  only being given in restricted 
  contexts).
- Changing contextual factors 
  impacts explicit memory for 
  infants, preschoolers and 
  adults indicating they have 
  similar memory systems!

Question 10

Summary of the Procedural vs Declaritive Memory Debate:

Answer 10

It is difficult to measure explicit (declarative, conscious) memory in infants, but some scientists argue that since the factors that impact adults’ explicit recall (like the changes to feature of stimuli, context, or length of retention interval) also affect infants’ memory during long-term recall, then long-term recall on the mobile task must tap declarative memories.

Question 11

Can forgotten memories become accessible again if appropriate cues are given?

Rovee-Collier (1993) use a __ paradigm

Answer 11

reactivation paridigm

Rovee-Collier (1993)
What happens when you extend the time between learning and test phase? (gradually information is forgotten and infants become more dependent on contextual cues to trigger memories; much like adults)
How do we test this? Use a reactivation paradigm!

Reactivation paradigm
A procedure in which the participant, usually an infant, is given a reminder of an earlier learned, but apparently forgotten, memory
that enables this memory to become accessible again.

Steps:
1. Baseline.

2. Teach mobile-kick
   contingency

3. 3-month old's who have 
   forgotten the kick-mobile 
   relationship after a delay of 1 
   week (kick rate falls close to 
   baseline in delayed retention 
   phase)

4. The reactivation phase
   consists of a reminder that
   pulling on the ribbon makes
   the mobile move (reminder)
5. 24 hours later test whether
   their kick rate increases from
   close to baseline.

6. Results:
 They found that after the 
   reactivation phase, it triggers 
   the memory again, and the 
   infants kick rate increases 
   from baseline. Test was 
   successful and by providing 
   an appropriate cue you can 
   recover memories and 
   observe the kicking 
   behaviour. With reminder, 3- 
   month-olds show intact 
   memory of causal 
   connection even at 28 days 
   after original training. Two 
   month old infants up to 14 
   day delay and by six months 
   old infants can recall the 
   contingency up to 3 weeks.
 This can also explain 
   childhood amnesia- why 
   without cues to trigger or 
   reactivate memories they’re 
   forgotten.

**young infants are able to 
  develop long-term memories 
  of causal events or 
  contingencies with the help 
  of retrival cues. You can 
  recover lost memories. Young 
  infants can develop long-term 
  memories for causal events 
  and memory retirval is 
  governed by the same retrival 
 cues for infants as in adults.

Question 12

Memory of Causal Events Without Explicit Instruction
 Events where the causal 
   relationship is not shown but 
   we are told that A = B and A 
  = C, we can infer that B must 
  = C (even though we were 
  not told that B = C).
 Are infants able to do this? 
   Remember relationships that 
   are not explicitly shown as 
   being causal?

Answer 12

Yes. We can use the puppet deferred-imitation task

Barr, Rovee-Collier & Campanella (2005)

Steps:
1. Infants (3-6 months) are 
   shown two puppets (A& B) to 
   build an association 
   between them. 
2. A couple days later, we 
   show one puppet a 3-step 
   sequence with the puppet 
   (A) remove the mitten from 
   the puppet, rattle it to make 
   a sound, and them place it 
   back on the puppet.
3. A day later we test whether 
   infants will imitate the 3-step 
   sequence on the target 
   puppet (B).

Logic:
 Can infants remember what 
   they saw and apply it onto a 
   target stimulus (B) which the 
   association was NOT taught.

Results:
 6-month old's pass the 
   deferred imitation task and 
   copy the actions of (a) on 
   puppet (b) for up to ten 
   weeks after the initial 
   exposure.
 3-month-old are only able to 
  pass the deferred imitation 
  task if they’re given a 
  reminder cue before the test 
  (i.e., show mitten rattles).

Implications:
 Infants can generalize 
   memory and their learning of 
   ordered events onto new 
  stimuli even when the causal 
   relationship is not explicitly 
   shown.
 Only if (A) & (B) shown 
   together and not separately!

Basics of the Puppet Deferred-Imitation Task:
1. Show that puppet (a) = (b)
2. Teach the 3-phase 
    sequence with one of the 
    puppets. (A = X; sequence)
3. Test whether they can 
    imitate sequence (x) taught 
    on A on the target puppet 
    (b). In other words, if A=X 
    and A=B then B=X.

*Provides evidence that 
  infants can remember a 
  sequence of actions and 
  imitate it on novel stimuli! 
  Infants’ imitation is much     
  more sophisticated than we 
  once thought.

Question 13

Infants can even form more complex associations between memories of objects & events that are physically absent. Infants can even form more complex associations between memories of objects & events that are physically absent.

Cuevas, Rovee-Collier & Learmonth (2006)

Answer 13

Cuevas, Rovee-Collier & Learmonth (2006)

Steps:
1. Infants (6-months old) were 
   shown that puppet (a) = (b)
2. They were then taught a 
   causal relationship within a 
   specific context (kick-mobile 
   in patterned crib)
3. They were then shown one 
   of the puppets above the 
   crib to build an association 
   between puppet (a) and the 
   mobile-kick and crib pattern 
   (3 items of information).
4. If babies can remember if 
   puppet (A) = mobile context 
   which should be 
   remembered for up to 2 
   weeks, then we should be 
   able to trigger the mobile- 
   kick action when they show 
   them puppet (b) in test phase 
   (puppet a = b).
5. To test whether infants have 
   transferred the association 
   from puppet (a) to puppet (b) 
   we get the 6-month old’s to 
   watch a (3) sequence event 
   with puppet (b) (take mitten 
   off, rattle it, put it back on). 
   Two weeks later they tested 
   whether they recalled the 3- 
  step action after 2 weeks. 
  *the memory of mobile should 
   exert a spreading effect and 
   guide recall of puppet b for 
   two weeks. 

Main point:
Babies can form complex associations; puppet a knowledge is transferred to puppet b (mobile= a, a=b). They can understand that events are complex and interconnected and this is reflected in their encoding of the event.

**If both puppet become linked 
  to the mobile-kick context 
  which they will recall for 2 
  weeks 
  (A=B, A transferred onto B). 
  Than any information about 
  puppet (b) that will 
  inadvertently be added to the 
  mobile connection should 
  also be recalled for 2 weeks.
**associative learning, spread 
  of activation = grouped 
  assosication.

Question 14

Why are we learning about how sophisticated infants’ memory is?

Answer 14

 The information is strikingly different for what most people and previous developmental researcher’s assumptions of preverbal infants’ cognitive capabilities. They can encode, recall and manipulate knowledge from past experiences to help navigate their physical world full of stimuli.
 Attention & Memory tasks tells us that they can hold memory representations of events which are causally connected, and not explicitly shown causal events (i.e., complex).
 Helps them process and encode the vast stimuli in their environment. Memory development suffers when they’re in stimuli impoverished environments (less interconnected, less developed working memory, less recall) than stimulus rich environments.

Question 15

what are the different ways to study memory in infants?

Answer 15

the mobile task differed imitation or a combination of both.

Question 16

How might we even directly test whether infants are using visual information to guide attention?

Answer 16

Use the attentional pre-cueing task for infants

Gilmore & Johnson (1995)

Steps:
1. Fixation:
 Infants are encouraged to 
   focus or fixate on the 
   center of the screen (i.e., 
   stimuli in center screen).
2. Cue Present:
 A second stimuli or 
  warning cue is presented 
  on the left or right of the 
  center screen.
3. Cue Absent:
 The warning stimuli is 
   removed from sight.
4. Time Out:
 All screens are blank,
5. Show Targets:
  A target (i.e., toy) is 
   presented on either the 
   left or right side of the 
   center screen.

Logic: 
 The warning cue signals 
   which side of the screen 
   the target will appear. If 
   infants can pay attention 
   to this cue and benefit 
   from it, we should see 
   them look for the target 
   on the same side of the 
   screen they were shown 
   the warning cue. 

Results:
 6-month-olds show (even 
   from delay phase 
   onwards) preference to 
   look at cued location side 
  over delays for 3-5sec.

Implication: 
 Infants’ can maintain (or 
  remember where the cue 
  was and use this 
  information to plan where 
  they will look next; update 
  their working memory) a 
  representation of spatial 
  location of cue (i.e., 
  suggests early operation 
  of working memory), and 
  infants use the information 
  in working memory to plan 
  eye movements.

Question 17

Attentional pre-cueing task converted to suit adults?

Answer 17

Attentional pre-cuing task used with infants is based on Posner et al.’s (1978) classic pre-cuing task used for adults.

Converted into a video game for adults.

Steps:
1. Participant is asked to 
   concentrate on the white 
   cross in the centre of the 
   screen and use the left or right 
   arrow keys to select which 
   side of the screen they see a 
   white box appear.
2. However, the outline of a 
   white box acts as a warning 
   cue which appears on either 
   the right or left hand side of 
   the screen before the white 
   box is shown.
3. The question is whether 
    people are able to respond 
   quicker if the warning cue 
   matches the side the target 
   white box is presented 
   (congruent=faster; 
   incongruent=slower).
4. To avoid boredom of 
   participants which can have 
   negative impacts on the 
   results. Researchers turned 
   this into a video gain which 
   exploited adults motivational 
   system to work for rewards. 
5. The centre screen is 
   transformed into a floating 
   path in space the character 
   runs along (enjoyment), collect 
   bananas for a monkey 
   (reward) and defeat enemy 
   space ships by hitting left or 
   arrow keys (warning and 
   target cues).

Important Note:
 The pre-cure trial can either 
   be valid or invalid.
o Valid pre-cure trial:
- Where the warning cue 
  indicates where the target 
  stimuli will be presented. If 
  your paying attention to the 
  warning cue your focus should 
  be on that side of the screen 
  and your reaction time to the 
  target cue should be quicker.
o Invlaid pre-cue trial:
- Where the warning cue 
  doesn’t tell you the correct 
  side the target cue will be 
  presented. In this case your 
  attention will be on the worng 
  side of the screen and your 
  reaction time will be slower.

Findings:
 Same results to Posner et al.’s 
  Attentional pre-cuing task in 
  both infants and adults!
 Infants reaction times are 
  longer in the invalid pre-cue 
  condition relative to the valid 
  pre-cue condition.

Implications:
 Infants and adults pay 
  attention to a location 
  information paying attention to 
  a location improves your ability 
  to respond to stimuli there.
 A skill used in adults is present 
   in infants as young as 6 
  months old.

Question 18

How are infants able to discriminate between visual information?
How would we study this?
what are the three ways?

Answer 18

(1) Visual Preference
Technique
Fantz (1961;1966)

o We know that 7 month old 
   infants have a preference for 
   looking at complex images 
   with high visual contrast 
   (blue check and blue swirls) 
   which implies that they pay 
   attention to images they can 
   see well. They can visually 
   discriminate between the 
   blue and white check pattern 
   relative to a blue square.
o Using this technique Fantz 
   also showed us that infants 
   as young as 2-3 months 
   show a visual preference for 
   schematic faces (human 
   faces over circles; a 
.  predisposition I infants to 
   pay attention to human faces 
   has an evolutionary 
   advantage for social beings).

Steps:
1. Infants (7-months) are 
   presented with a pairs of 
   stimuli (i.e., blue square or 
   clue and white check square)
2. Researchers are interested 
    in whether infants are able 
    to discriminate between the 
   two images which is implied 
   if they spend a significantly 
   longer time looking a one 
   screen than the other.
3. Compares looking time of 
   two images that are 
   presented side by side. 

Problem:
o How do we interpret no 
   difference findings? When 
   infants show no visual 
   preference for one image 
   over the other? Is it that 
   infants are not able to 
   discriminate between the 
   two images or that they can 
   but do not have a preference 
   between them?

(2) Habituation Technique
Addresses this problem

Steps:
1. Habituation Trial:
   Where infants are 
   repetitively presented with a 
   single stimuli (circle) until 
   they no longer react to it (i.e., 
   familiarised, habituated to, 
   bored).
2. Dishabituation Trial:
    A novel stimuli is presented 
   (cross).
3. Test Trial:
    If there is recovery of 
    attention (increase in 
    looking time) to new 
    stimulus, then indicates 
    discrimination between 
    old/familiar and new stimuli.

Logic:
 Researchers are interested 
   to see if the infants attention 
   is caught by the novel stimuli 
   and they spend more time 
   looking at the new stimuli. 
 This indicates they are able 
   to discriminate between the 
   two images (old/familiar and 
   new stimuli). 
 This is its advantage over 
    method 1. 

(3) You can combine method 1
& 2
habituation technique with
preference technique

Slater et al. (1983)

Steps:
1. Learning Phase:
2. Use habituation technique 
    to familiarise infants to a 
    particular stimulus (circle)
3. Test Phase:
4. Adopt a preference 
    technique by presenting 
    them with an old and new 
    stimulus side by side to see 
    which one they spend more 
    time looking at.

Logic:
 If they’re able to remember 
   which item they’ve seen 
   before and discriminate 
   between the two images, 
   then they should show a 
   preference for looking at the 
   novel stimuli.
Results:
 Slater confirmed that even 
   newborn babies can 
   discriminate between 
   old/new stimuli and 
   demonstrate a visual 
   preference for novel stimuli. 
 We can conclude that the 
   absence of a preference in 
   seven-month-old infants in 
   Fantz’s experiments did not 
   arise out of an inability to 
   distinguish between crosses 
   and circles

Question 19

Important Distinction about Visual Discrimination Tasks (1-3)

Answer 19

o The Habituation Method and 
   the Visual Preference 
   technique were historically 
   designed to study infants 
   “basic visual discrimination”.
o Although these techniques 
   were historically used to 
   suggest that infants visually 
   see the world in a non- 
   random fashion, in recent 
   years, some scientists have 
   ventured further to boldly 
   claim that the technique 
   could be used to show 
   babies have abstract 
   cognitive understandings of 
   the world around them.

Question 20

What is cross-modal perception?

Answer 20

Cross-Modal Perception
The ability to match perceptual information across modalities (cross-modal perception) also appears to be present from early in life. Infants seem to be able to connect visual information with tactile information, and auditory information with visual information, from soon after birth

Question 21

Can infants match and weight perceptual information across different modalities? Coordinate sensory information in our physical world?

Visual & Tactile
Meltzoff & Borton (1979)

Answer 21

Meltzoff & Borton (1979)

Steps:
1. Infants were either asked to 
   suck on a pacifier with a 
   smooth or rough surface 
   (textile)
2. The pacifier was removed, 
   and they were then 
   presented with two images 
   of the rough and smooth 
   surfaced pacifier (visual).
3. Researchers were interested 
   in what image the infant 
   showed a preference to look 
   at; will they be able to 
   integrate the textile and 
   visual information on the  
   pacifier they have to look 
   longer at the image of the 
   pacifier they were sucking 
   on?

Results:
 Studies show 29-day-old 
   infants look longer at the 
   shape that matched the one 
   they tactually explored in 
   their mouths (preference for 
   visual image that matched 
   the texture of the pacifier 
   they had experience with).

Implications:
 This suggests that ability to 
   make cross-modal 
   connections between oral 
   touch and vision develops 
   very early (29-day old infants 
   can coordinate visual and 
   oral sensory information. 
   Suggests an early 
   understanding of cross- 
   modal equivalence.

Question 22

What about visual and auditory information? Can infants coordinate this cross-modal information? How would we test this?

Hyde et al. (2013)

Answer 22

Hyde et al. (2013)
Using electrophysiological (EEG) Study they showed infants can match sight and sound information.

Steps:
1. Habituation phase:
- 5-month-old infants were 
  familiarized (habituated) to 
  pairs of sights and sounds 
  (e.g., short caterpillar with a 
  shot beep sound or a long 
  caterpillar with a longer tone = 
  Congruent). 
2. Note: The researchers made 
   the task attention worthy by 
   having the picture of the short 
   and long caterpillar stay on 
   the screen for 1000 - 
   milliseconds – makes visual 
   size as well as auditory 
   information in the task distinct 
   and relevant. 
3. Test phase:
- Infants were either shown the 
  familiar congruent sound and 
  visual information (short 
  caterpillar with a shot beep 
  sound or a long caterpillar with 
  a longer tone = congruent) or 
  an incongruent pairing 
  (incongruent= short caterpillar 
  with long tone or long 
  caterpillar with short tone) to 
  see which information would 
  the infants prefer to look at?

Results:
 EEG results show that there is 
   greater amplitude (activity) 
   towards the familiar 
   congruent pairing relative to 
   the incongruent pairing. 
 In contrast, young infants 
   familiarized to incongruent 
   pairings (short-long/long- 
   short) showed no differences 
   in early processing or 
   attentional orienting between 
   congruent and incongruent 
   pairings in the test phase.

Implications:
 Means there is enhancement 
   of attention to and 
   remembering of information 
   where there is match between 
   sight and sound (cross-modal 
   congruent information).

Question 23

But does that also mean infants cannot detect when there is mismatch between sight and sound at all? Do infants only focus on congruent information?

(Srinivasan & Carey, 2010)

Answer 23

Of course, infants can detect incongruence in information across different modalities.

(Srinivasan & Carey, 2010)

Steps:
1. 9-month-olds after 
   familiarized to congruent 
   pairings of sight and sound 
   (long-long, short-short).
2. Infants are tested on 
   whether they pay more 
   attention to incongruent or 
   congruent pairings.

Results:
 Older infants show a novelty 
   preference where they pay 
   more attention to and look 
   longer at incongruent 
   pairings than congruent 
   pairings.

Implications:
 Younger infants may show 
   enhanced attention to when 
   vision and audition are 
   linked (congruent) which is 
   good for learning about 
   stabilities in the world. 
 As infants get older, they 
   perhaps start to pay more 
   attention to unusual 
   (incongruent) pairings of 
   information.

Question 24

Can discriminate visually. Can we use habituation methods to study whether infants can realise visually distinct objects belong to the same category? Group information on distinctive objects into abstract categories? Higher level categories.

Slater & Morrison (1987)

Answer 24

Yes we can – by varying the stimuli that infants observe during the habituation phase. Here are three examples of research studies that have done so.

(1) Slater & Morrison (1987)

   Steps:
1. Habituate infants to a series 
   of different patterned circles 
   (3- to 5-months).
2. Test how infants react to a 
   new circle they haven’t seen 
   before and another novel 
   shape. Which one will they 
   look at longer?

Results:
 Infants looked at the novel
shape longer (dishabituation).

Implications:
 Suggests that infants formed 
   a “prototype” of the shape 
   (“circle”) during habituation 
   to which they compared 
   subsequent stimuli.
 Novelty preference where 
   new stimuli that is 
   incongruent with the 
   developed higher order 
   category are looked at 
   longer.

*distinct objects can be a part
of the same category.

(2) Cohen & Caputo (1978)

Use the same technique where researchers varied the stimuli that infants observe during the habituation phase to see how infants consolidate knowledge.

Steps:
1. 7-month-old infants were 
   split into three groups in the 
   habituation phase:
a. Habituated to the same 
    single stimulus (stuffed toy)
b. Habituated to changing 
    stimuli (different animal 
    stuffed toys)
c. Habituated to unrelated 
    objects (cat, car, ball etc.)

2. How do infants in these two 
    groups treat this 
    information? Will they class 
    distinct object into one 
    category? Researchers 
    tested this by comparing 
    looking time across two 
    stimuli to see if they 
    demonstrate a visual 
    preference between a toy 
    skunk and a rattle.

3. Test: Compare visual
   preference when novel
   stimuli are presented
   (stuffed skunk or rattle)

Results:
• Infants in ‘Changing Animal’ 
  Group found the skunk 
  “familiar” (look less) & looked 
  longer at the rattle = abstract 
  category formed.
• Infants in the ‘Same Animal’ 
  group found both items 
  interesting and showed no 
  visual preference = no 
  category formed.
• Infants in the ‘Objects’ group 
  found both items interesting 
  and showed no visual 
  preference = no category 
  formed. 

(3) Younger (1985)

Helps address questions from example 2. A stronger demonstration that infants can code correlational structure between features across the stimuli! repetitions across stimuli.

Steps:
1. 10-month-olds allocated into
either Broad Condition or
Narrow Condition.

2. They were familiarized
   (habituated) with different
   pictures of creatures where
   the neck (long/short) and leg
   size (long/short) varied
   (patterns or correlations
   between stimuli structure
   change).

3. Broad condition showed lots 
    of variation in leg and neck 
    length which were mixed 
    and matched apart from 
    value (3). They never saw 
    animal with leg/neck length 
    of three (i.e., the average 
     value in length). Narrow 
     condition only saw biggest 
     or smallest value of neck 
     and leg (1-5) only two 
     variations!

4. Test phase (1 & 2) Will infants 
    look longer at animal with 
    average neck and leg length 
    or the animal with the 
    extreme neck and leg 
    values?

Results:
 Infants in broad condition 
   preferred to look at extreme 
   looking creatures (1-5).
 Infants in the narrow 
   condition preferred to look at 
   the average creature (3-3).

Explanation of Results:
 Infants in the broad condition 
   were exposed to a variety of  
   neck/leg lengths but size 3 (1- 
   2-4-5). They grouped this 
   information by creating 
   an/singular average category 
   with the values (3-3) 
   therefore when they were 
   presented with an average 
   and extreme looking creature 
   in the test phase they 
   preferred to look at the 
   extreme creature. Novelty 
   preference for the extreme 
   preference.
 Infants in the narrow 
   condition were exposed to 
   extreme creatures and 
   created two extreme 
   categories of creatures (1-5; 
   5-1) therefore they found they 
   showed a novelty preference 
   for the average looking 
   creature.

Implications:
 Infants are not passively 
   absorbing information they 
   pick up on correlations 
   between the features of the 
   stimuli they encounter.

*three authors show that 
 infants can perceive that 
 visually distinct objects belong 
 to the same category and can 
 code correlational structure  
 between features across  
 stimuli.

Implications:
 This suggests that Group 
   Two (changing) formed 
   category of “stuffed animals” 
   from Habituation Phase. 
 Infants cognitively analyse 
   the visual information in their 
   physical world and search for 
   patterns or similar features of 
   distinctive objects to form 
   abstract categories to help 
   making learning new 
   information easier. Bold 
   claim. Are we confident that 
   infants are using statistical 
   learning to do this? Are 
   infants actually processing 
   different features (e.g., legs 
   and neck, or legs and eyes) 
   of each animal, rather than 
   merely habituating to a single 
   recurring feature (e.g., legs). 
   In real world, features can co- 
   occur so is there research 
   showing infants can detect 
   correlations between certain 
   features?

Question 25

How are infants able to do this? and how do their perception skills progress so rapidly?

Answer 25

Through statistical learning (Saffran et al., 1996)

 Attending to distributions 
  and regularities in visual (or 
  auditory) input to learn which 
  features occur together. 
 Statistical learning helps 
  infants discriminate features 
  in stimuli that occur together 
  from features in stimuli that 
  seldom occur together.

 For example, babies would 
  show more attention to 
  syllables ty-ba because 
  through experience and 
  statistical learning they know 
  these syllables are 0.02% 
  likely to follow one another 
  relative to pre-tey is 80% 
  likely to follow one another 
  (i.e., conditional probability).

Question 26

Why is it important to appreciate studies that show infants can attend to and remember visual details and can group details to form or remember larger events and higher order categories?

Answer 26

 Too much attention to small 
  details (instead of the general 
  bigger picture) can also be a 
  liability (though can also lead 
  to islets of abilities). For 
  example, one important 
  characteristic of autism 
  spectrum disorders is 
  enhanced attention to details 
  but have weakness in 
  noticing the global picture.
 Individuals with autism 
  especially good at picking out 
  hidden shapes in pictures, 
  and gazing at the stand-out 
  letter in a pattern
 Individuals with autism are 
  more error prone at going 
  beyond local details to 
  interpret the global picture 
  (seeing letter S instead of 
  fixating at the little letter H)
 Understanding how attention 
  and perception develops 
  typically and how it is 
  measured can help us 
  understand and support 
  people with autism (i.e., they 
  would see the letter H and 
  not pick up that they 
  collectively form the letter s).
 Compare typical with atypical 
  development to help design 
  treatments for autism.

Question 27

Perceptual structure is measured in three main facets:

Answer 27

1. Spatial relations (i.e., X is 
   taller than Y)
2. Occlusion relations (i.e., X is 
   out of view & covered by Y)
3. Support relation (i.e., X is 
   resting on Y)

Question 28

Is there research to show infants have understandings, knowledge or expectations of perceptual structure in the visual world, and how do we test it?

It’s uses blank and blank techniques
It test the blank concept

Answer 28

• Use violation of expectation
  paradigms.
• If infants have such
  expectations, we can
  introduce violations of these
  expectations and measure
  behavioural responses (i.e.,
  looking time) to the
  violations.

What is a violation of expectation paradigm?

• The Object Concept
• It is a technique for figuring
  out infants’ cognitive
  understandings of the world.
  It uses habituation
  (familiarised to form a rule or
  expectation of how the
  object is expected to work)
  and dishabituation
  procedures (rule violation)
  whereby an infant’s
  dishabituation reaction (e.g.,
  increased looking behaviour)
  to an unexpected event is
  used to infer that the infant
  knows about the laws that
  govern how such events
  ought to work.
• The object concept: One
  core aspect to understanding
  structure of perceptual world
  is that objects continue to
  exist when hidden.
• The violation to expectation
  paradigm is well known for
  testing the object concept in
  young infants. We always
  need to consider piagets
  theory that infants are
  believed to hold NO
  representations of objects in
  infancy (up to 18 months, only
  after this can they create
  symbolic representations of
  objects) and therefore when
  object is out of sight it
  doesn’t exist. Thus, work in
  this area which disproves this
  is very important for adding
  to theory on infants’
  perception.
• We can use the VOE
  paradigm to find out if infants
  understand spatial and
  occlusion relationships and
  in so doing show that infants
  understand object
  permanence (object
  concept)!

Question 29

Do infants represent spatial relations?

Using VOE paradigm-

Baillargeon & Graber (1987)

Answer 29

Baillargeon & Graber (1987)

Steps:
1. Habituation Phase:
- Infants (5 ½ month old 
  infants) are familiarized to the 
  video of a short and tall carrot 
  going behind a wall where it 
  is can not be seen till it 
  comes out the other side till 
  habituation is reached.
2. Test Phase:
- They compare looking time 
  between expected and 
  unexpected event phase. In 
  the test phase the wall is 
  shorter in the middle an 
  expected event is when the 
  short carrot goes behind the 
  wall and is occluded to us 
  (i.e., expected because the 
  carrot is shorter than the 
  wall). An unexpected event is 
  when the tall carrot goes 
  behind the wall and we do 
  not see the top of the carrot 
  as it goes behind the short 
  wall (i.e., unexpected 
  because the carrot is taller 
  than the height of the wall, so 
  we expect to see it).

Logic:
- If infants truly understand 
  spatial relations about height 
  of the object in relation to 
  other objects (wall) in the 
  physical world than infants 
  should pay more attention to 
  violation to expectations 
 (impossible events) relative to  
 possible events.

Results:
- Research shows infants look 
  reliably longer at the 
  impossible tall-carrot event 
  than at the possible short- 
 carrot event

Implications
- The Results implies that 
  infants develop expectations 
  about:
(a) each carrot continued to 
     exist behind the screen 
     (object concept), 
(b) each carrot retained its 
     height behind the screen 
    (remember and use spatial 
    relational information to 
    build expectancies about 
    objects in their physical 
    world),
(c) each carrot pursued its 
     trajectory behind the screen 
    (trajectory continues even if 
    object is out of sight), 
(d) the tall carrot to appear in 
     the screen window and 
     were “surprised” that it did 
    not (longer looking time at 
    impossible event implies 
    they built expectations 
    about the object and were 
    surprised when it did not 
    follow the expected pattern).

*infants represent spatial 
 relationships and disprove 
 paigets theory by showing 
 young infants have an 
 understanding that objects 
 exist out of sight and they 
 retain their physical properties 
 when hidden and expect  
 objects to behave in 
 accordance to their physical 
 properties (i.e., height).

Study 2:
If we accept that 5 ½ month infants are cognitively reasoning about spatial relationships, develop expectancies on how objects will behave in relation to their environment based on the physical properties they hold, then if we reveal the trick to them than they should no longer be surprised by the impossible event (second study by the same authors tested this).

Steps:
- Before Habituation
- Infants were shown one of 
  two events: you show infants 
  two short carrots or two tall 
  carrots standing motionless 
  on either side of the 
  windowless screen (reveal 
  secret behind the trick, so to 
  speak; that there were two 
  objects present and explain 
  why you didn’t see the top of 
  the tall carrots head when it 
  “passes” behind the short 
  wall), and then run the 
  standard habituation and test 
  phases – the effect goes 
  away. Infants now no longer 
  find the tall-carrot event at 
  test “surprising” (no 
  difference in looking time 
  across short/tall events).
- This suggests that infants 
  may be using information 
  about two carrots to make 
  sense of the events, and that 
  infants capable of relatively 
  sophisticated reasoning 
  about the physical world (i.e., 
  object permeance at a very 
  young age).

Question 30

Do infants represent occlusion relations?
Second type of evidence of infant’s ability to understand object permeance is to look at occlusion studies-

Baillargeon (1987)
Drawbridge Study

Answer 30

Baillargeon (1987)
Drawbridge Study

Steps:
1. Habituation:
- 3.5- to 4.5-month-old infants  
  were habituated to a 
  drawbridge which moved 
  from 0-180 degrees.
2. Test:
- Then compare looking times 
  to impossible event (there is a 
  wooden block place in the 
  path of the drawbridge, yet it 
  still goes from 0-degress to 
  180-degrees; two objects can 
  not occupy the same space 
  or pass through one another) 
  versus a possible event (the 
  wooden block stops the 
  screen from at about 112- 
 degrees).

Results:
- Babies in impossible 
  condition (dishabituation) 
  looked longer than babies in 
  possible condition.
- Very young infants 
  understand object 
  permanence; they represent 
  the box as continuing to exist, 
  even when hidden by screen! 
  and understand that it would 
  block the path of the 
  drawbridge and cause it to 
  stop at 112 degrees when 
  they make contact.

Implications:
- Paying more attention to 
  impossible event supports 
  that young preverbal infants 
  understand that objects 
  continue to exist out of sight 
  and should block its path.

Question 31

Criticisms of the Drawbridge study?

Answer 31

Does it really show infants understand object permeance?
*Remember that habituation and dishabituation tasks with preferential looking times were
originally designed to answer rudimentary basic level questions about infants’ perceptual abilities (i.e., discrimination) as opposed to more ambitious questions about cognitive reasoning.

The Debate:
1. Interpretation:
Infants understand object permanence in an abstract sense!!

2. Interpretation:
   Infants merely continue to see the box even once it is occluded due to a kind of lingering visual memory trace which is in their minds’ eye; and consequently, infants look longer at the “impossible” event not because it violates rules of physics but because of the perceptual novelty of seeing one object pass through another object.

What do we mean when we say lingering visual memory traces?

In vision, lingering visual memory traces are easy to demonstrate – like bird in cage visual impression. So, in the Drawbridge case, it’s just like infants continuing to “see” the drawbridge pass through the box which is perceptually interesting. But the results may have little to do with cognition of object permanence.

Video of bird cage and bird on opposite sides of a piece of paper that when it is spun quickly it looks like the bird is in the bird cage. This is because the image of the birdcage lingers in the brain for a couple of milliseconds after the image is removed from out field of vision. Thus, when we are shown the image of the bird it appears to be inside the birdcage (fuse two images together to make sense of the world).

In their minds eye they are seeing the block and is fused with current image of the draw bridge completing its 180 turn and thus to them looks like it is going through the object. Thus, they’re believed to be responding to this novel image and not cognitively reasoning about how the physical characteristics of the block, that continues to exist when out of sight, should block the path of the drawbridge (i.e., violation of expectation).

Question 32

How do we support the claim that infants are developing abstract senses of occlusion relationships?

Answer 32

Steps:
- Infants see a large cube 
  placed on top of the path. A 
  screen covers the cube, and 
  a car rolls down. [But the 
  block is secretly removed so 
  that its out of the way.] The 
  car rolls down and 
  “magically” the car appears 
  on the other side of the path 
  seemingly unaffected by the 
  block (i.e., the block should 
  have obstructed its path and 
  stopped its motion; 
  perceived that the car 
  somehow went through the 
  block). 6-months olds’ are 
  surprised by this event 
  (impossible event) and look 
  for a long time at such 
  impossible events.

Findings:
- The findings suggest infants 
  understood the block’s 
  permanent existence behind 
  the screen even if they 
  couldn’t see it. Additionally, 
  they understood that the 
  rolling car couldn’t pass 
  throughout the block (i.e., 
  due to their physical 
  properties it should stop the 
  car in its motion because 
  they cannot go through each 
  other), suggesting that 
  infants understand object 
  permanence.

Implications:
- This provides additional 
  evidence on infant's concept 
  of object permeance in a 
  different scenario of an 
  occlusion event.

Question 33

Another way to support infants’ ability to understand object permeance is to look at their brain activity (neurological markers) during impossible events in a violation to expectation task.

Kaufman et al. (2003)

Answer 33

Kaufman et al. (2003)
- blending Looking Time & 
  Cognitive Neuroscience 
  approach to showcase 
  infants’ understanding of 
  occlusion relations (object 
  permanence)

Steps:
- Compared looking time when 
  infants (6-month-old) 
  observed an expected object 
  disappearance event with an 
  unexpected object 
  disappearance event. 
- In the expected condition a 
  toy train would go through a 
  tunnel and out the of the 
  room and they see a hand 
  reach  down to pick up the 
  train but is no longer there.
- In the unexpected condition 
  the toy train goes into the 
  tunnel, and not out the other 
  side, so when the hand 
  reaches down to take the 
  train out of the tunnel, we are 
  shocked to see it isn’t there, 
  the hand puts the tunnel back 
  down and the train come out 
  of the tunnel).

Results:
- Infants pay more attention 
  (longer looking time) at the 
  unexpected disappearance 
  event relative to the expected 
  disappearance event.
- EEG shows increase in right- 
  temporal brain activity; seems 
  infants’ brains attempting to 
  maintain representation of 
  object’s existence in the face 
  of contradictory visual input 
  (brain activity coincided with 
  the moment that the hand 
  lifted up the tunnel and 
  showed the train was 
  unexpectedly gone).

Implications:
- The EEG results supports that 
  infants put hard cognitive 
  work to maintain their 
  cognitive processes and 
  engage in cognitive 
  reasoning when violations to 
  expectations occur to 
  understand why it happened.
- Converging evidence adds 
  additional support for their 
  object permeance 
  understanding in early 
  infancy.

*This does not mean that they
understand everything about
the perceptual structure of
objects in our physical world or understand everything on the permeance of objects. For example, we do not know yet if infants understanding of disappearing objects extends to the appearance of objects!

Study 2:
- They conducted a second 
  study which compares 
  looking time between 
  expected appearance of 
  objects and unexpected 
  appearance of an object. 
- In the expected appearance 
  event the toy train goes into 
  the tunnel and the tunnel is 
  lifted to reveal the train the 
  tunnel is placed back down 
  and the train comes out of the 
  tunnel. In the unexpected 
  appearance conditions, the 
  toy train enters the tunnel and 
  comes out the other side, 
  then a hand lifts up the tunnel 
  to reveal a train (we saw the 
  tunnel leave the room why is 
  it still in the tunnel). 

• Results:
• indicate that young infants
  showed no statistical
  difference in looking time
  between expected and
  unexpected object
  appearance conditions. No
  object permeance skill on
  object disappearance not on
  appearances, this skills is
  developed later on in life
  when they have more
  experience to these events.
• Implications:
• Overall, research suggests
  that infants DO have an
  understanding of object
  permanence, and this
  understanding covers object
  disappearances from early in
  life, and then perhaps very
  much later infants will start to
  understand object
  appearances.

Question 34

Now we may ask do infants understand relationship between object contact and the level of support it gives objects?

Baillargeon, Needham & De Vos (1992)

Answer 34

Baillargeon, Needham & De Vos (1992)

Steps:
1. Infants were shown a 15% 
   contact event and a 100% 
   contact event. In the 15% 
   contact event, they see a 
   hand push a box to along a 
   table till only 15% of the 
   bottom of the object is in 
   contact with the table and yet 
   it remains to be stable and 
   not fall off the edge. In the 
   100% contact event infants 
   see a hand push the box 
   along the table’s edge but 
   100% of the object stays in 
   contact with the table. 
2. They compare looking times 
   between the 15% 
   (unexpected) and 100% 
   (expected) condition to see if 
   they understand the need for 
   the object to be supported in 
   order to stay up on the table.

Results:
- Older infants (from 6.5- 
  months of age) looked longer 
  at the 15% contact event 
  relative to the 100% contact 
  event showing that they have 
  support relationship 
  understandings.
- Then using the same method 
   these infants were shown a 
  15% contact and a 75% 
   contact event (percentage of 
   the bottom on the box in 
   contact with the top of the 
  table). Adults can understand 
  that 75% contact gives 
  sufficient support to keep the 
  object stable but 15% is 
  insufficient and gravity will 
  cause the object to fall. If 
  infants understand this they 
  will look longer at the 15% 
  event relative to the 75% 
  event, and there is no 
  difference between 75-100% 
  events.

Results:

Results support this: Older infants (from 6.5-months of age) appreciate how much support (e.g., 75% versus 15% contact between surfaces) must be available for objects to be stable and supported.

BUT younger infants (e.g., 3-month-olds) fail to understand amount of contact.

Young infants (e.g., 3-months of age) expect box to fall when pushed completely off platform and to remain stable otherwise; any amount of contact between top and lower box is considered sufficient to ensure stability. (3-mth-olds will look longer at 0% contact compared to 100% contact) (but 3-mth-olds show no difference in looking times between 15% and 100% contact)

Contact = support (do not have a sophisticated understanding yet)

Experience is needed for infants to develop understanding of the AMOUNT of contact needed for an object to be supported!

Basic understandings of object permeance, with the three methods, appears to be innate but sophisticated understandings require experiential learning that older infants have.

Question 35

Why is it important to know that infants have core principles about the world and are sensitive to violations of expectations?

Answer 35

If infants are particularly sensitive to VOE it also means they are more likely to benefit from these responses. Focusing on events that VOE provide excellent opportunities for learning

Question 36

Stahl & Feigenson (2015)

Answer 36

Stahl & Feigenson (2015)

Steps:
- Are shown a support or 
  solidity event:
- In the support event the toy 
  car was pushed to the edge of 
  the track, and it ever falls onto 
  the floor (expected) or floats 
  on the air without support 
  (impossible). In the solidity 
  event, the car was pushed 
  along the track and hits a 
  barrier and stops their 
  (expected) or it hits the barrier 
  and continues to go through it 
  (impossible). – violation to 
  principle of support and 
  solidity.
- Habituated to expected than 
  dishabituated to impossible 
  event/knowledge violation 
  scenario.

Results:
- 11-month-old infants 
  selectively explore objects in 
  ways specific to the violation 
  observed; they bang objects 
  that violate expectations of 
  solidity and drop objects that 
  violate expectations of 
  support. 
- “Infants look longer at 
  surprising events suggest not 
  only that infants are equipped 
  with core knowledge about 
  fundamental aspects of the 
  world and that this knowledge 
  is harnessed (they use the 
  knowledge and test objects 
  that violate our expectations) 
  to empower new learning 
  even in infancy.” (Stahl & 
  Feigenson, 2015)

Key Point:
- infants who observed the 
  unexpected event were more 
  likely to interact with that 
  object than when it took the 
  expected path. This provides 
  novel evidence that infants 
  pay more attention to and 
  want to interact with things 
  that violate their 
  understanding of the world to 
  figure out why it didn’t follow 
  their expectations and learn 
  from it.
- This is why its important to 
  provide babies with diverse 
  stimulating experiences to get 
  them to push their 
  understanding, interact with 
  objects in their environment 
  and create more sophisticated 
  cognitive representations of 
  objects that they can use to 
  further their learning and 
  memory.

Question 37

Summary Points:

Answer 37

It was not long ago (1970s) that Paigets developmental theory where he viewed infants feel it as one great blooming, buzzing confusion. Assailed by their senses and there was not structure to their perception or thinking. Within 50 years of developmental research, we know they have organised memory, attention systems, visual discrimination ability and perceptual structure demonstrate they have an organised mind (four strands of research which support this; memory, attention, visual discrimination and perceptual structure).

Working Memory Span study shows that the development of the prefrontal cortex aids the development of their working memory span from five to 12 months of age.

Adults and infants have similar working memory systems; changes to stimuli and contextual factors impairs their explicit long-term memory indicating it has capacity limits and is context specific like adults. Without language skills it is hard to undoubtedly confirm they’re consciously accessing this information but we can use converging information from mobile and deferred-imitation tasks to build a convincing argument

Important to notice that 6-month old infants were able to remember information about their physical world for up to 2 weeks but in the deferred-imitation task it was only up to a day. This is because infants took a more practical approach to learning in the mobile task and interacted with the objects whereas in the puppet study they passively watched the researcher interact with the puppets.

The mobile task is an example of how infants can develop associations between objects (cause-effect relationships) and the differed-imitation task is an example of how infants are able to connect multiple associations together or apply a learnt association onto equivalent stimuli.

When the mobile task and the differed-imitation task methods are combined a spreading of activation allows for the recall timeframe to extend from 1 day to up to 2 weeks (repetition of task could also extend this window).

Infants Attention is structured, focused and operates like adults.

Visual Discrimination Tasks are used to test whether infants can distinguish between novel and old stimuli. An important skill for attention. Two techniques to measure this; visual preference technique (uses 2 screens) and habituation technique (uses to screens) (or combination uses one screen).

Caveat of visual preference tasks is that it is hard to draw conclusions from no difference in looking time results. Is the infant equally excited, equally bored of both stimuli or not able to distinguish between them?

These tasks show that infants are able to develop higher order categories about stimuli in their environment through the use of statistical learning (automatic process of noticing patterns between stimuli and categorising this information into a cognitive framework).

To be able to live in a world full of information from our five senses we need to be able to integrate information across modalities.

Why do younger infants prefer congruent cross-modal information than novelty or incongruent information? This is because when they’re young they want to be able to perceive the world as structured, ordered and stable. From 10-months we see that infants develop a novelty bias and begin to prefer incongruent cross-modal stimuli (i.e., caterpillar study).

Statistical Learning is an automatic process developed in young infancy which allows us to identify patterns within their physical world, build expectations about how objects should behave to structure their attentional systems and develop abstract categories that ultimately aid their development.

Sophisticated visual analysis is evident but are they thinking (cognitive) when they perform this analysis? Use VOE paradigms, perceptual structure.

Three example studies; 1) the carrot study tested spatial relations about the height of the objects; 2) the box on a table study tests their reactions to support/contact relations ; 3) train in a tunnel study to test their reactions to disappearances and appearances of objects (occlusion).

The drawbridge study is another occlusion study that tests whether infants have object permeance (the understanding that objects exist when hidden). It demonstrates that infants have a sophisticated cognitive understanding of their physical world; they understand the physical properties of object (coexist in same place or time, go through one another or that they continue to exist when hidden).

The debate on whether the drawbridge study shows cognitive reasoning or if its due to a lingering memory trace or they merely like the movement more (180 > 120).

We impose meaning in our interactions with our physical world and not assailed by information from our four senses. We learned about the different kinds of studies and their methods and findings to show that even pre-linguistic infants lead cognitively meaningful lives, so much so that infants capable of remembering, attention, visual discriminations. They even expect structure in the physical world.