Infant Cognition (plus finish perception)• Results from Test• Results from Survey• First part of Paper due on Tuesday• Visual Cliff/depth perception/constancies• Themes of Infant cognitive development• Piaget’s 6 stages of infant cognition• René Ballargeon’s studies• Categorization• Causality• Infant Number concepts• Memory Development in Infancy• Individual differences in Infant Cognition

Test Scoring and Results

• Score = # multiple choice *2 + # fill in the blank *2 + essay scores (10 pts. For essay) + 6 point curve

• Distribution– A – 16– B – 26– C – 31– D – 27– F – 23

Results from Questionnaire• N = 113• Much to fast 6• A little too fast 52• About right 46 • A little too slow 9• Much too slow 0• Average is right between a little too fast and about right.• Many complaints about the room and size of class.• Many would like more interactive activities in class, videos of actual child

behavior, and group activities.• Some appreciated the connection between lectures and the text and

others failed to see the connection• Several would like more specificity in the study guide for the the test.

Depth/Distance Perception

• Visual Cliff (Walk and Gibson) 6-7 months• Campos (1978)– Notice at 2 months (orienting response)– Fear after they can crawl

• Looming (Yonas, et al)– Blink at 1 month– Defensive response at 3 months

• Pictorial depth cues between 5 to 7 months

Size and Shape constancy

• Some skill at birth• Skill improves by 3 to 5 months

Themes of Infant Cognition

1. The orderly nature of cognitive development.

2. Infants are active participants in their own development.

3. Infant cognitive development is marked by both advances and limitations.

First two years

• Advances achieved during infancy include:• basic understanding of physical world• ability to use basic cognitive tools such as understanding

categorization & number• ability to combine actions into sequences• increasingly powerful & flexible memory

• Limitations until late in infancy include: emphasis on perception & action absence of language & symbolic abilities limited flexibility in emerging cognitive abilities limited memory capacity

Piaget’s Theory and the Nature of Infants

• Infants’ understanding of the world is limited to what they know through sensory awareness and motor acts.

• Infants actively construct an understanding of the world.

• http://www.ovguide.com/jean-piaget-9202a8c04000641f80000000000a4720

Copyright © 2004 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.

Processes of Developmental Change

Adaptation The process by which children change in order to function more effectively in their environment.

Assimilation Applying an existing capability without modification to various situations.

Accommodation

Modifying an existing strategy or skill to meet a new demand of the environment.

Schemes Cognitive structures that can be applied to a variety of situations.

Equilibration A self-regulatory process that produces increasingly effective adaptations.

Key Terms in Piaget’s Theory

Piaget’s 6 Stages of Sensorimotor Development

• Stage 1: Reflexes, 0-1 month• Stage 2: Primary Circular Reactions, 1-4 months• Stage 3: Secondary Circular Reactions, 4-8 months• Stage 4: Coordination of Schemes, 8-12 months• Stage 5: Tertiary Circular Reactions, 12-18 months• Stage 6: Beginnings of Representational thought,

18-24 months.

The Object Concept

Stages 1 & 2: Infants respond to objects with interest but seem not to understand object permanence.

Stage 3: A partial view of something is now enough to remind them of the whole object.

Stage 4: Infants search for hidden objects, making the A, not-B error.

Stage 5: No longer make the A, not-B error, but may get upset when object isn’t at location B.

Stage 6: At last acquire mature understanding of object permanence.

Video of Object Permanence

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhHkJ3InQOE

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jW668F7HdA Research with primates

• René Ballargeon• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2ovHFt5

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• Categorization• Causality• Infant Number concepts• Memory Development in Infancy• Individual differences in Infant Cognition

New interesting studyUhls and Greenfield

• 100 6th graders assessed for ability to identify primary emotions (happy, sad, angry, afraid) in photographs of faces.

• Children this age normally spend 4.5 hrs./day on a computer, notebook, of smart phone.

• Half of the kids are told to do nothing different for a week while the other half were taken to a summer camp at which no electronic devices were allowed.

• The second group improved in their ability to read emotions and far exceeded the control grp.

Categorization

• Perceptual Categories– Squares, triangles, circles

• Distinction of kinds (Mandler, 1998)– Distinction between natural and artificial

Causality• Michotte and the perception of causality• Infants discriminate between some causal and non-

causal events• http://www.yale.edu/perception/Brian/demos/causality-

Basics.html– http://perception.research.yale.edu/causality/launching.mov– http://perception.research.yale.edu/causality/spatialGap.mov– http://perception.research.yale.edu/causality/

temporalGap.mov – Leslie (1984) brick pushing another brick– Baillargeon and supported versus non-supported box

Number Concepts

• Starkey & Cooper (1980) 4- to 7-month olds– Discriminating 2 and 3 but not 4 vs 6– Disagreement about whether it is really number

or amountAntel & Keating (1983)

Demonstrated in neonatesCanfield & Haith (1991)

3-month-oldsSequence an location of 1 and 2

Memory

• Piaget and effecting an Mobile• Rovee-Collier– under what conditions do

infants remember– https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPJiB-oGMN0

&list=PL1ACFACF774EFA277&index=28

Individual differences in Infant memory

• How complex a figure can they habituate to• How long to habituate• Correlation to later IQ moderate after 18

months.