Physical World and Spatial Cognition Flashcards
how have researchers studied infants’ understanding of objects?
objects through methods like violation-of-expectation looking-time tasks, and habituation or familiarisation followed by test trials.
what happens following habituation or familiarisation?
in these tests, infants are presented with unexpected and expected scenarios.
what types of information can children represent about objects?
unity
continuity
cohesion
contact and inertia
gravity
unity
5m infants infer object boundaries by analysing movements.
if occluded elements move together, infants infer a single unitary object (Kellman and Spelke, 1993).
continuity
infants expect objects to exist in one location at a time, using spatiotemporal continuity
cohesion
objects are perceived as solid bodies, and expected not to interpenetrate other objects
contact and inertia
infants understand objects need to touch other objects to influence their movement, and cannot move on their own
gravity
infants expect unsupported objects to fail, and express surprise if they do not
why is studying object knowledge in newborns challenging?
challenging due to poor vision and short awake spans, but imprinting studies in animals suggests there may be some way to explore this
why did spelke and carey generate their theory of core knowledge?
infants display sophisticated knowledge about the physical world of objects around them before they are able to manipulate objects themselves
theory of core knowledge
evolution endowed humans and other animals with systems of knowledge about specific aspects of the world (e.g., object, places, approximate numbers).
how do the systems of TOC operate?
operate independently, have their own limitations, and are used to facilitate further learning – nativist perspective.
benefits of the core knowledge system of objects
helps infants interpret events – making inferences about hidden locations – and guides their exploration
limitations of the core knowledge system of objects
infants may struggle to encode object features, seen in Xu and Carey (2004) where 10m infants failed to expect two objects behind a screen
what different frames of reference can infants use to represent space?
- egocentric
- landmark-based
- allocentric
egocentric (viewer-dependent)
objects are represented relative to one’s body
landmark-based (viewer independent)
objects are represented relative to landmarks or salient features of the environment
allocentric
objects are represented relative to landscape or celestial constants
historic understandings of frames of reference vs new evidence
historically, egocentric representations were considered simpler, but evidence suggests infants have more objective ways of representing space via viewer-independent coding:
evidence of viewer-independent coding
newcombe (1999)
kaufman and needham (2011)
what did newcombe (1999) demonstrate?
5m infants can use geometric properties of the environment to locate hidden objects.
what did kaufman and needham (2011) find?
infants by 6m can set allocentric spatial representations.
they used the table as a stable reference point, and were dishabituated when objects moved location with respect to these landscape constants.
how did cheng (1986) reveal differences in human/animal spatial representations for navigation?
disorientation task found rats rely on geometric information to guide search for a reward
when disoriented, what errors did rats make?
geometric errors by returning to a corner with similar geometry to where the reward was located.
hermer and spelke (1994) infants’ navigation
notice landmark information (coloured wall) but fail to combine this with allocentric geometric information when searching for a hidden object
what do children use language for?
to integrate different forms of spatial information
types of verbal expressions used to integrate spatial information
- spatial expression
- task-relevant non-spatial expression
- task-irrelevant verbal expression
spatial expression
links object location to a spatial cue
task-relevant non-spatial expression
emphasise the utility of the landmark in the task
task-irrelevant verbal expression
draw attention to the landmark in an unrelated manner
