Children's Thinking Chapter 4

Know that older children sometimes violate a principle in their explicit problem solving that infants abide by in their looking behavior. What is one explanation that has been given for this surprising finding?

- In the drawbridge study, they do not expect the drawbridge to stop earlier for a tall block than for a short block. - Their sensitivity to height-related violations of Solidity depends on the event in which the violation takes place.

When a face is presented in an array of six objects, 6-month-olds spend more time looking at the face than at any of the other objects. However, 3-month-olds do not. There are two explanations for this developmental trend. Describe one.

- 1. Arrays are too distracting for 3-month-olds - 2. 3-month-olds scanning of arrays is directed by the salient low-level features in the array

How did researchers demonstrate that infants were capable of (intersensory) matching their visual perception of an object with their tactile perception of it?

- 6 month olds were allowed to touch, but not look at the object. Later they were shown the object next to the novel object. - They spent more time looking at the novel object. - The second experiment demonstrated the reserve effect (from vision to touch)

What is the Goldilocks effect in infants' attention to stimuli that vary in familiarity or frequency?

- An infants preference shows in many contexts for stimuli that are not too familiar but also not too novel.

Auditory sensory thresholds are higher in infants than they are in older children. What is the main reason for this difference?

- Auditory thresholds (the faintest sounds they can hear) are higher in infants than in older infants. Fluid in the middle ear is a part of this reason

Sometimes babies show a preference for novel stimuli over familiar stimuli, but other times they show the opposite preference. How does this difference depend on the time it takes a baby to establish a memory representation of the familiar stimulus?

- Babies show attract to novel or familiar in different situations - In early processing, they favor familiar over unfamiliar stimulus

In Baillargeon's later work, she found that 3-month-olds did not detect height-related violations of the principles of Solidity and Persistence. Describe an example of this kind of violation.

- Going behind something (occlusion) is more frequent even then going into something (containment), which is more frequent event then being covered by something (covering) - EX: A tall object is placed behind and is occluded by a shorter object. This is impossible, of course, and 4.5-month-old infants act surprised when this happens. Now consider nearly the same situation, but instead of the taller object being placed behind the shorter object, it is placed within it. Now infants do not show surprise until about 7.5 months and it is not until 12 months that they show surprise when a shorter object covers a taller object

What are the main findings that were described in the textbook (p. 101) regarding the development of color vision from birth to 4 months?

- In general, newborns seem to process color information the same way adults do but their color vision itself is extremely poor - However, about 4 months of age, their color perception improved greatly and is similar to that of adults.

Bahrick and Watson (1985) investigated the ability of 3- and 5-month-olds to integrate sensory information. The infants were blocked from seeing their own legs, then shown two videos simultaneously. The older infants looked at one more than the other. Describe the two videos.

- Infants were shown a live video of their own legs moving next to a pre-recorded video of their legs moving (they were blocked from seeing their own legs) - 5 month old spent more time looking at the pre-recorded video and 3 month old showed no preference.

What is the difference between intersensory integration and intersensory matching? Which tends to be the more challenging process?

- Intersensory Matching: Recognizing a stimulus when it is encountered in a different sense modality. - Intersensory Integration: Detecting the common source of ongoing stimulation in multiple areas - Matching tends to be more challenging than integration

Somewhat surprisingly, 2-month-olds are less likely than newborns to turn in the direction of a human voice or imitate an adult's facial expression. What occurs in the maturation of the brain that explains this developmental change?

- Lower regions of the brain, which control many reflexes, mature before higher regions (the cortex) - From birth to 2 months, the lower regions control looking and direct it towards face. - After 2 months, cortical processes dominate looking. Reflexive looking is inhibited.

What method was used to discover that newborn babies already recognize the sound of their mothers' voice?

- Method 2: Contingent Response

Six object characteristics were identified in lecture and the textbook that draw infants' attention. What are they?

- Movement - Contrast - Symmetry - Top-heaviness - Having curved parts - Concentric pattern

Schaal et al. (2000) ran an experiment in which some expectant mothers consumed anise-flavored food during pregnancy and others avoided it. How did the olfactory (smell) preferences of the newborn babies of these two groups of mothers differ?

- Newborns in the first group preferred the smell of anise over other scents. The second group did not.

A famous experiment by Johnson and colleagues measured how far newborns would track a drawing of a human face and a drawing of a scrambled face. What did they find?

- Newborns tracked faces rather than non-faces, imitated facial expressions, and turn their heads in the direction of a sound.

How does the answer to the last question explain why younger babies often spend more time looking at the familiar stimulus, but older babies often spend more time looking at the novel stimulus.

- Once a memory is established, they spend more time on novel. The older the baby, the more quickly they can establish a representation of a familiar object then spend time on novel. - The younger babies take longer to establish familiar object. Less time on novel object.

What are two evolutionary proposals for why our species has such advanced musical cognition?

- One hypothesis is that music played social function, stemming from early humans' ability to synchronize body movements to external beat. - Another proposal for the origins of music looks to early mother-infant interaction

People commonly refer to the five senses - vision, hearing, touch, taste, and smell. However, there are many other senses. Name or describe three other senses.

- Pain -Cold/Heat - Pressure

Infants will notice if a set of 8 objects is replaced by a set of 16 objects. However, they will not notice if a set of 16 objects is replaced by a set of 24 objects. Name or describe the rule that explains this pattern of results.

- This is called Approximate Arithmetic - The age group's critical ratio us 2:1 - This has the same findings as Rhesus monkeys - Size of critical ratio declines with age

Infants show various forms of object constancy. Finish the following definitions:

- Size constancy: perceiving an object as having an unchanging size even though it... is closer by or farther away -Shape constancy: perceiving an object as having an unchanging shape even though it... may change properties -Brightness constancy: perceiving an object as having an unchanging brightness even though it...may look a certain way -Color constancy: perceiving an object as having an unchanging color even though it...may change

In lecture, I described various sensory stimulation methods that can be used to soothe a crying baby or reduce a baby's pain. What are these methods?

- Tactile: Swaddling, Caressing, Skin-to-skin contact - Auditory: Soft speech, heartbeat, repetitive or random sounds - Visual: Reduce light - Interoceptive: Rocking

Regarding the last point, describe how the responses of younger infants (4- and 6-month olds) differed from those of older infants in the study that used the stimuli. ( the monkey grunting or cooing)

- The 4- and 6-month-old infants looked significantly longer at the faces that matched the sounds, but the 8- and 10-month-old infants did not.

To test infants' understanding of gravity, a researcher showed one group this possible event: (The photos with the rectangular block with a block onto with a smiley face being pushed to the left or the right side edge) She showed another group of infants an impossible event. Describe (or draw) it.

- The block was hanging off the ledge

Kidd et al. (2014) conducted several trials in which infants heard three different sounds. Some sounds were repeated more often than others. Infants learned that a sound would play until they looked away from a figure on the screen. The infants spent the most time looking in response to what kinds of sounds?

- The infants spent more time focusing attention on sound events that are "moderately probable."

What do the results of fMRI research with newborns indicate about hemispheric specialization for music;

- These findings suggest that the hemispheric specialization for music observed in adults is the result of neurobiological constraints present in neonates

Researchers have learned a great deal about perception by studying infants' natural reactions. Know the examples given in lecture of how this method was used to study infant perception of a) odor; b) the sweetness of a solution; and 3) depth (specifically, the presence of a "cliff").

- This falls under method 1: Natural Reactions. The examples are: - Making a face or turning away when presented with a bad odor - Drinking faster when sugar is added to water - Hesitating when about to crawl over a drop-off

What are two other forms of auditory learning that have been shown to occur during the last trimester of fetal development? (Hint: one involves a children's story and the other involves a spoken language.)

- This falls under method 2: Contingent Response. It says: - An example of this is the DeCasper and Spence: - The mothers had read one of three brief stories twice a day for final 6 weeks of pregnancy. - The infants altered their sucking rate so they would hear the tape of the familiar story. - They showed this preference even if the readers of the stories in the tapes were unfamiliar women.

What was the point of the infant study that used the stimuli below? (the photo with the upside down face and the right side up face with eyes covered)

- To see how infants respond to "eye contact" - They did not show a preference for either upside down or upside right while the eyes were covered.

Regarding music perception, know that infants

- can imitate pitch, melody, and rhythm, as well as detect changes in these features; - show the use-it-or-lose-it pattern in their ability to learn native vs. non-native melodies; - prefer "good" music over "bad" (and know some of the qualities of "bad" music).

We have already discussed how infants lose their ability to perceive non-native phonemes and non-native musical structures. Know how perceptual narrowing has also been demonstrated in...

- face perception (narrowing to the faces of one's own species and the faces of one's own race) -vocal perception (narrowing to the vocalizations of one's own species) -intersensory integration (narrowing to visual-auditory integration of the vocalizations of one's own species)

The results of Baillargeon's famous swinging drawbridge study supported her claim that infants as young as 3-month-olds abide by the principles of Solidity and Persistence. What were the impossible event and the possible event in this study?

-Impossible event: The bridge going through the block Possible event: The bridge stopping when it meets the block

In her TED talk, Patricia Kuhl described some things her lab tried to prevent American infants from losing their ability to hear the difference between Mandarin phonemes. What worked and what didn't?

-What didn't work was the babies learned through a screen or audio didn't learn Mandarin - What did work is when babies were exposed to Mandarin for 12 sessions, they were as good as babies in Taiwan who'd be listening for 10 and a half months.

What is the evidence that newborns 1) recognize their mothers' face 2) respond to the attractiveness of a face 3) respond to eye contact?

1.) Face of own mother vs another mother 2.) More attractive face than less attractive face 3.) Face looking at them vs looking away

A typical infant develops 20-20 vision by the age of

12 months

What is the visual acuity of a newborn baby?

200-400 to 20-600

What age do infants ability to detect difference between non phonemes decline and their ability to detect the difference between native phonemes increase?

6 to 12 months

How can the dishabituation method be used to test whether infants can learn a category (e.g., the cat category)?

After habituating infant to several members of some category, present a new member of the category or new non-member - If they only dishabituate to the non-member, we conclude that they have habituated to the category (not just the individuals) - The Cat Caterogy ex: - Infants (3 months) shown a sequence of pictures of cats were surprised and when they saw a picture of a dog they were not, this suggests that they were sensitive to the category of cats

In the domain of object tracking, what are the principles of

Continuity - Objects move along an uninterrupted path Solidity - Two objects cannot occupy the same place at the same time Persistence - Even if one loses sensory contact with an object, it stays in its place unless its moved

The phonemes, or sound categories, that make up the words in a language vary quite a bit from one language to another. What is the amazing fact about young infants' ability to detect sound categories that are not used in their native language (non-native phonemes)?

Infants are sensitive to all of them but as they get older they lose their sensitivity to non-native phonemes.

Infants' sensitivity to such height-related violations develops in an event-bound fashion. They first show this sensitivity in _____________ events, then show it in ________________, and finally show it in ______________ events. (Choices: covering, containment, occlusion)

Occlusion; Containment; Covering;

A classic experiment found that very small preterm infants benefitted from receiving extra tactile stimulation (e.g., caressing) every day. What were these benefits?

They gained weight faster, spent more time awake, and developed cognitive and motor skills more rapidly

Of the senses, which is the least well-developed at birth?

Vision

According to probabilistic reasoning theorists, infants tend to perceive impossible events as being ______________________ events. a. highly improbable b. moderately probable c. highly probable.

a. highly improable

In one study, 10- to 12-month-olds watched an experimenter place a different number of crackers into two boxes. They were then allowed to select one of the boxes. The number of crackers that the experimenter hid varied. The infants tended to select the box that had more crackers when a. one box had two crackers and the other box had three crackers b. one box had three crackers and the other box had four crackers c. both a & b d. neither a nor b

a. one box had two crackers and the other box had three crackers

According to Core Knowledge Theory, the core knowledge that infants use when observing addition and subtraction of small numbers is ___________ the core knowledge they use when observing addition and subtraction of large numbers. [Choices: the same as; different from]

different from

When looking at a face, 1-month-olds spend most of their time looking at _________ features, whereas 2-month-olds spend most of their time looking at __________ features.

external; internal

Piagetian theorists such as Richard Bogartz have offered an alternative explanation for the results of looking studies such as Baillargeon's original swinging drawbridge experiment. They propose that the time that an infant spends looking at an event is simply based on the time it takes them to __________________________ and compare them. Infants tend to look at impossible events longer than possible events only because ___________ take longer to process than ____________ .

form representations; novel events; familiar events

According to probabilistic reasoning theorists (Bayesian models), infants keep track of the ____________ events, which allows them to gauge the probability that various events will occur in various situations.

frequency of various

According to Core Knowledge Theory, core knowledge is __________ knowledge that gives cognitive development a head start; evolved because it promoted _______________; is __________ with other primate species (choices: shared vs. not shared) is domain- _______________ (choices: specific vs. general)

innate; survival; shared; specific

Teglas et al. (2011) showed infants a container with 3 objects of one shape and 1 object of another shape (e.g., 3 balls and 1 cube) bouncing around inside it. They blocked the infants' view of the container briefly, then revealed that an object had come out of the container. When their view had been blocked for only a split second, infants looked longer when the ________________________ had come out. When their view had been blocked for 2 seconds, infants looked longer when the _____________ had come out.

objects next to the opening; more numerous ones