Physical World and Spatial Cognition Flashcards

1
Q

how have researchers studied infants’ understanding of objects?

A

objects through methods like violation-of-expectation looking-time tasks, and habituation or familiarisation followed by test trials.

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2
Q

what happens following habituation or familiarisation?

A

in these tests, infants are presented with unexpected and expected scenarios.

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3
Q

what types of information can children represent about objects?

A

unity

continuity

cohesion

contact and inertia

gravity

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4
Q

unity

A

5m infants infer object boundaries by analysing movements.
if occluded elements move together, infants infer a single unitary object (Kellman and Spelke, 1993).

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5
Q

continuity

A

infants expect objects to exist in one location at a time, using spatiotemporal continuity

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6
Q

cohesion

A

objects are perceived as solid bodies, and expected not to interpenetrate other objects

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7
Q

contact and inertia

A

infants understand objects need to touch other objects to influence their movement, and cannot move on their own

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8
Q

gravity

A

infants expect unsupported objects to fail, and express surprise if they do not

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9
Q

why is studying object knowledge in newborns challenging?

A

challenging due to poor vision and short awake spans, but imprinting studies in animals suggests there may be some way to explore this

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10
Q

why did spelke and carey generate their theory of core knowledge?

A

infants display sophisticated knowledge about the physical world of objects around them before they are able to manipulate objects themselves

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11
Q

theory of core knowledge

A

evolution endowed humans and other animals with systems of knowledge about specific aspects of the world (e.g., object, places, approximate numbers).

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12
Q

how do the systems of TOC operate?

A

operate independently, have their own limitations, and are used to facilitate further learning – nativist perspective.

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13
Q

benefits of the core knowledge system of objects

A

helps infants interpret events – making inferences about hidden locations – and guides their exploration

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14
Q

limitations of the core knowledge system of objects

A

infants may struggle to encode object features, seen in Xu and Carey (2004) where 10m infants failed to expect two objects behind a screen

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15
Q

what different frames of reference can infants use to represent space?

A
  1. egocentric
  2. landmark-based
  3. allocentric
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16
Q

egocentric (viewer-dependent)

A

objects are represented relative to one’s body

17
Q

landmark-based (viewer independent)

A

objects are represented relative to landmarks or salient features of the environment

18
Q

allocentric

A

objects are represented relative to landscape or celestial constants

19
Q

historic understandings of frames of reference vs new evidence

A

historically, egocentric representations were considered simpler, but evidence suggests infants have more objective ways of representing space via viewer-independent coding:

20
Q

evidence of viewer-independent coding

A

newcombe (1999)
kaufman and needham (2011)

21
Q

what did newcombe (1999) demonstrate?

A

5m infants can use geometric properties of the environment to locate hidden objects.

22
Q

what did kaufman and needham (2011) find?

A

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.

23
Q

how did cheng (1986) reveal differences in human/animal spatial representations for navigation?

A

disorientation task found rats rely on geometric information to guide search for a reward

24
Q

when disoriented, what errors did rats make?

A

geometric errors by returning to a corner with similar geometry to where the reward was located.

25
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
26
what do children use language for?
to integrate different forms of spatial information
27
types of verbal expressions used to integrate spatial information
1. spatial expression 2. task-relevant non-spatial expression 3. task-irrelevant verbal expression
28
spatial expression
links object location to a spatial cue
29
task-relevant non-spatial expression
emphasise the utility of the landmark in the task
30
task-irrelevant verbal expression
draw attention to the landmark in an unrelated manner