Motor Development + Learning (ch. 5) Flashcards
Reflexes
Newborns start off with tightly organized patterns of action.
Some have adaptive values while others don’t
Grasping reflex
Newborns closes their fingers around anything that presses against their palm when stimulated
- strong enough to hold own weight
Rooting Reflex
- When stroked on the cheek, turn their heads in the direction of touch and open their mouths –> good for breastfeeding
- More likely to occur when infant is hungry
Sucking Reflex
When in contact with breast/nipple, open their mouth for food, thus leading to swallowing reflex as well
Tonic Neck Reflex
- not a beneficial or automatic reflex but is when an infant’s head turns or is turned to one side and the arm on that side of the body extends while the arm and knee on the other side flex
Moro Reflex (startle)
Throwing back the head and extending the arms, then rapidly drawing them in, in response to a loud sound or sudden movement
Stepping Reflex
Stepping or dancing with the feet when being held upright w/ feet touching a solid surface
- a neonatal reflex of infants living one leg and then the other in a coordinated pattern
Cultural Differences
- Some cultures/areas of the world have certain opinions about crawling or environment doesn’t allow their children to crawl, so they can’t develop those locomotor skills.
- While others encourage crawling with limb massages and stretching
Affordances
Possibilities for action offered, or afforded, by objects and situations
ex = small objs afford the possibility of being picked up and that solid flat surfaces afford stable walking etc
- infants discover this by figuring out the relations between their body and abilities w/ things around them
Role of Motivation
- Their milestones are determined by what they can perceive of the external world and their motivation to experience it.
- infants who are better able to interact with their environment mayb have an advantage in perceptual and cognitive development by being able to seek out new opportunities for learning
Complexity of Reaching
requires muscle development, postural control, and development of various perceptual and motor skills
“Disappearing Reflex” Case by Thelen (1995)
- infants submerged in water with feet touching bottom, triggering their stepping reflex
- Typically, this reflex would stop at around 2mo, but through this research, found with practice in this tank, infants continue to do the stepping reflex
- Disappears because of an increase in body mass as they get older (example of dynamic systems theory!)
Pre-reaching Movements of Infants
Clumsy swiping in general vicinity of objects
- at about 3-4mo, they begin o successfully reach for objects, although movements are initially somewhat jerky and poorly controlled
Experiment about pre-reaching behavior
- Infants given velcro mittens and toys which allowed them to pick them up
- Shouwed that infants had an increase interest in objects and an earlier emergence of their ability to reach independently, as well as greater patterns of object exploration
What age does stable sitting and smooth reaching develop?
Around 7 months since they can lean forward to capture objects
Importance of manipulating objects
Self directed visual expereince helps infants learn labels for objects and those who gather more variable visual info by manipulating them show larger increases in vocabularies over time
Social Component of Reaching
Infants around 8mo are more likely to reach for a far away object when an adult is near. They have the support near if they’re unsuccessful on their own
Self-Locomotion
At about 8mo, infants move around in the environment on their own (no longer limited to being where someone else carries/puts them)
- Infants, rather than crawling babies, can easily see a caregiver’s face (i.e. why infants look longer at faces)
At what age do infants first begin walking independently?
Around 11 to 12 months and keep their feet relatively far apart for support
Scale errors
The attempt by a young child to perform an action on a miniature object that is impossible due to the large discrepancy in relative size of the child and object
Media errors
A child using interactive tech tries to pass or receive an object through the screen
Habituation
- A decrease in response after repeated stimulation
- reveals learning has taken place and the infant has formed a memory representation of the stimulus
Speed of Habituation
- Is believed to reflect the general efficiency of the infant’s processing of info
- Infants who habituate rapidly (take relatively short looks and/or who show a greater preference for novelty) tend to have higher IQs
Statistical Learning
Involves detecting statistical patterns
EX: certain events occur in a predictable order, certain objects appear at the same time and place, etc (like the regularity with which the sound of Mom’s voice is accompanied by her face)
Experiment of Statistical Learning
2-8mos were habituated to 6 simple visual shapes presented one after the other with specific levels of probability. In a test, the order of appearance of one or more of the shapes changed = the infants looked longer when the structure inherent in the initial set was violated, suggesting they learned the order of the shapes originally presented
What patterns do infants prefer? [Goldilock effect]
They prefer to attend to certain types of statistical patterns like patterns that have some variability RATHER than perfectly predictable or very complex (random) patterns
Classical Conditioning
- plays a role in infants’ learning about the relations between significant environmental events
EX: predictable meal times and sucking reflex is activated, and they’re given milk which is a pleasurable sensation
Unconditioned stimulus (UCS)
- the nipple is the infant’s mouth is an example of this that elicits an unlearned response
Unconditioned Response (UCR)
- the sucking reflex elicited
Conditioned Stimulus (CS)
- Learning occurs when an initially neutral stimulus (i.e. breast of bottle) repeatedly occurs just before the UCS
Conditioned Response (CR)
Gradually, the originally reflexive response becomes a learned behavior, triggered by exposure to the CS (i.e. anticipatory sucking movements now begin as soon as the baby sees a bottle or breast)
Instrumental Conditioning
- aka operant conditioning
- involves learning the relationship between a behavior and its consequence
Positive reinforcement
- A reward that reliably follows a behavior and increases the likelihood that the behavior will be repeated
- a contingency relation exists between the behavior and the read: the infant performs the target behavior, THEN they receive the reinforcement
Carolyn Rovee Collier (1997) Experiment
- Ribbon tied to infant’s ankle + connected to a mobile hanging above. Naturally kicking their leg, the infant (as young as 2mo) learn the relation between their leg and the mobile = they increase their rate of kicking
- Mobile movement serves as a reinforcement for the kicking
- 3mo remember the kicking for 1 week but 6mo remember for 2 weeks
Observational learning
- Imitation is a form of observational learning
EX: after watching adults slowly stick out their tongue, infants mimic this behavior - Other studies have failed to replicate this, thus calling this imitation into question
- 6 to 9mos seem to be able to mimic behavior (box light up experiment)