Module 7 - Conceptual Development

Question 1

define concept

Answer 1

ideas or understanding that can be used to group together objects, events, qualities or abstractions that are similar in some way
- understanding what a dog is
- learning colours
- understanding that we all have our own minds
- cause and effect
- death

Question 2

define categorical thinking

Answer 2

dividing the world into categories to use to make predictions about the world
- objects in the same category have similar properties, follow similar rules, etc.

Question 3

what are the 3 general categories?

Answer 3

1. people
2. other animals
3. inanimate objects

Question 4

define category hierarchy

Answer 4

layers/levels dividing sets into subsets into smaller subsets, etc. It will start to emerge around 3 months old and is known from habituation studies.
- will have no reaction when shown multiple pictures of dogs, but when shown a cat, they have a change in expression, linking to the fact that they notice they are in different categories
- children and adults don’t always see the same basic categories
- kids will learn categories from other (accommodation and assimilation)

ex. inanimate objects–> furniture –> chairs –> brands

Question 5

define perceptual categorization

Answer 5

grouping of objects with similar appearances (shape, colour,size)
- study looked at what basis do children generalize new category labels to new objects. Use unknown objects and got children to make assumptions about that object. before 5, only looked at superficial characteristics to guide categorization. from age 5 to adults, will look more into object function more than appearance

Question 6

what are the levels of hierarchical catgeories?

Answer 6

superordinate: more general level with broad criteria (dog is a animal that moves and eats)

basic: middle level typically generates first (dogs have 4 legs and are good pets of humans)

subordinate: more specific, highly specific set of criteria (this dog have pointy ears and a curly tail)

• there will always be exceptions to our criteria rules, making quick judgements to how we will group things

Question 7

define defining features

Answer 7

traits that define membership in a category, without these, they don’t belong in the category

ex. all cats are carnivores

Question 8

define characteristic features

Answer 8

common or stereotypical traits of members of a category, but aren’t necessary for membership

ex. cats usually have fur, but some dont

Question 9

how do children use characteristic and defining features to make categorical judgments?

Answer 9

• has 2 scenarios that describe robbers and see what children would say to me more accurately to meet the definition of a robber
• preschooler often rely on characteristic features when making the categorical judgement
• they get better at disregarding characteristic features to focus on defining
• STEREOTYPING

Question 10

define naive psychology

Answer 10

baseline understanding of how humans and other living beings behave in the world

Question 11

what are the 3 broad components of naive psychology?

Answer 11

intention: people act on the world independently and in line with their own goals ( <1year)
desire: people have their own wants and needs that vary across time and situations (1-2 years)
belief: peoples actions are guided by what they expect or think they known (5> years)

Question 12

why is naive psych so cool?

Answer 12

1. mental states are invisible - only see observable actions that result, cannot see hunger or goals
2. can link mental states to other mental states - belief -> emotion -> subsequent actions
3. while some aspects are evident early in life, others will take some time to come online - beliefs take up to 5 years to understand

Question 13

define early self-concept

Answer 13

understanding that the self is separate from others
- newborns can discriminate source of contact - if someone touches their face, they will turn, but wont turn if they touch their own
- at four months, they start to understand their own limitations - how they can only reach for things in their reach and that they can grasp
- around 2 years, discover mirror self-recognition - understanding that a mirror is showing themselves and will respond to the image but interacting with their own body and not the mirror (<18month will touch own face, 18-24 will touch own face)

Question 14

define the body-as-obstacle task used to help understand self-concept

Answer 14

• kid is placed on a string that will prevent the card from moving
• solution is to move to the side or front of the cart to be able to move it
• non western babies who struggled with mirror task will pass with ease
• western babies will do much worse, even when they were able to complete mirror task

Question 15

what is the study that looks at children’s understanding of intentions?

Answer 15

• by 6 months, kids can understand actions of others as goal-direction
• habituated the children for a hand to reach to the left side to get a ball
• one condition was for a the hand to reach for a different location and new object - created surprise
• next condition was new object in the old location - surprise
• last condition was old object in new location - surprise
• shows that the child understand the goal as grabbing the ball (associated an intention with the hand)
• when this study was done again but with a mechanical claw instead of a hand, they did not attribute a goal to the claw (understanding that not all things have goals and intention)

Question 16

define agency

Answer 16

the ability to monitor and act on one’s environment in accordance with one’s will or intention
- other people and animals are seen as agents for us

Question 17

define the Theory of Mind (ToM)

Answer 17

an organized understanding of how mental processes such as intentions, desires, beliefs, perceptions, and emotions influence behaviour
- at a young age, children think that everyone has the same thoughts and beliefs as them. will learn to discover that it is not true as they grow up
- Understanding the connection between people’s desires and their emotions is important (emerges in the end of the first year)

Question 18

what study did they do to understand desire?

Answer 18

• 12 month old observed an adults interactions with 2 cats, expressing desire to only act with one cats
• 2 conditions: one where the person was interacting with the act they desired interest in and one where they were with the other cat
• the condition where they were with the non-desired cats, they showed sign of surprise
• 8 month olds were not able to see the difference between the 3 interactions

Question 19

define false beliefs

Answer 19

• at age 3, children start to understand beliefs but struggle with false beliefs
  *false belief problems: test understanding that people will act on the basis of other own beliefs when the child known that those beliefs are incorrect

Question 20

what is a sally-anne task?

Answer 20

• sally has a doll and then leaves the room
• her friend sally moves here doll to a different location

true-belief condition: all kids will pass
false-belief condition: 3 yrs old with fail to account for false belief, point to the new location. 5 yrs old with know that sally has a false belief and point to the original location

Question 20

what is the appearance-reality tasks to look at children’s understanding of false belief?

Answer 20

• smarties tasks
• 3 years old will struggle to understand that others don’t have the same knowledge as them
• ask them what would be contained in a Smarties box, they assume Smarties
• show them that there are actually pencils in the box
• they get asked what someone else would think there is inside the box, and they say pencils (don’t fully understand that other people don’t have the same thoughts as them)
• 5 year old would recognize that another person would be fooled and would have a false belief
• there is a loophole, where if you tell the kid that you are gonna play a trick on the other person, they would get the answer right

Question 21

what are the foundations of theory of mind?

Answer 21

innate: there is an assocation between age and passing ToM tasks across diverse cultures
–> theory of mind module (TOMM): theoretical cognitive system devoted to understanding mental states in others, innate capacity humans have evolved

learned: having older and other sex siblings, it is related to the improvement of performance, exposure to false beliefs (MORE SUPPORT)

Question 22

ToM and ASD

Answer 22

common charactertistics: sensory sensitivites, heightened interest of fixation, impacted communication skills, difficulties with ToM and social reasoning (only <50% can pass these tasks from ages of 6-14)
- interventions can have great impacts: examples are Early Start Denver Model (for 1-2 years old to promote social orientation and adaptive skills through interactions, positive reinforcement of social behaviour is very big) and Applied behaviour analysis (can be applied at any time, using positive reinforcement to develop adaptive skills and foster resilience and independence)

Question 23

causal reasoning in infants

Answer 23

• simple for example of one block hitting another and seeing that the one hit will move
• 6 months will first get habituation to the of movement
• test trials will be that the 2nd block starts to move before it gets hit, creating surprised response
• end of 2nd year, children can infer the causal impact of one variable based on indirectly relevant info about another

Question 24

what is a blicket detector study?

Answer 24

• blicket detector is something that will light up when a blicket is placed on it, but will not when a non-blicket is placed on it
• used to determine was a blicket is through experiment
• 19 months were confused in choosing what was the blicket
• 24 month could consistently choose the correct blicket

Question 25

how magical is children’s thinking?

Answer 25

• a lot of research shows that children are quite mundane in their reasoning about the world

study: looking at children’s understanding of possible and impossible scenarios
- what could you own as a pet? dog, gryphon, tiger
- adults would be able to decipher whether or not you could have a tiger as a pet, not seen but is possible
- 4-6 years old would say no to having a tiger because they do not see it happen making them think it is impossible (showing how they are not magically thinkers)

Question 26

what are the themes that are prominent in conceptual development?

Answer 26

1. nature and nurture
2. the active child
3. how change occurs
4. sociocultural context

Question 27

what are some important aspects of physiological understanding that emerge in a child’s 2nd year?

Answer 27

sense of self, joint attention and intersubjectivity

Question 28

define false-belief problems

Answer 28

tasks that test a child’s understanding that other people will act in accord with their own beliefs even when the child knows those beliefs are incorrect

Question 29

define the theory of mind module (TOMM)

Answer 29

a hypothesized brain mechanism devoted to understanding other human beings
- matures over the first 5 years

Question 30

define object substitution

Answer 30

a form of pretense in which an object this sued as something other than itself (for pretend play)

Question 31

define sociodramatic play

Answer 31

activities in which children enact miniature dramas with other children or adults, such as “mother comforting a baby”
- usually is more sophisticated when playing with a parent or someone older who cans scaffold the play sequence (keep it going)