lecture 1b) visual development

Question 1

why do we focus on infancy when studying visual development

Answer 1

because there are very rapid changes i nthe first 2 years of an infants life and changes in one area enable changes in other areas

and helps us understand which abilities are inante and which have to be learned through experience

Question 2

what is a major struggle for studying infants

Answer 2

studying infants are different than methods for studying older children beacuse older can communicate more clearly with adults

Question 3

true or false: at birth, an infants vision is almost non existent and barely fucntional

Answer 3

false, they can visually scan their environment and pause tot look at things

Question 4

what are the 2 major methods in infant research

Answer 4

1) preferential looking paradigm
2) habituatiton paradign

Question 5

what does the preferential looking paradign take advanttage of

Answer 5

takes adcvantage of infant’s preference to look at “interesting” things

Question 6

explain the general idea of the preferential looking paradigm

Answer 6

1) present the baby with 2 stimuli side by side att the SAME TIME
2) if the baby lookings longer at one sitmuls that the other tthan tthat means that 1) they can distinguish between the two and have a preference for one over he oher.

Question 7

what does tthe pref looking paradign assess

Answer 7

assesses infants natural preference for stimuli

Question 8

what is a major limitation of tthe pref looking oarasign

Answer 8

babies cannot point therefore you need to try to deduce where they are kooking/focussing
=solution= use eye tracking devides

Question 9

in the pref looking paradigm, if the baby looks longer at one stim than the other, what does that mean (2)

Answer 9

1) thye can distinguish beetween the 2
2) they have a preference for one over the otther

Question 10

trtue or false: the habituation assesses the preference of an infant

Answer 10

false, assesses the ability to distinguish

Question 11

what dose the habituattion paradigm take advantage of

Answer 11

the babies nattural preference for novelty (new things)

Question 12

explain the habitutaion paradign generak

Answer 12

1) repeadely present infant with a stimulus until they habituate to it (ie: slowed, changes or stopped resoonse, looks at it less, gets bored)

2) present habituated “old” stim witth a new sttim

3) if baby changes its reaction to the new stim (dishabituation) it can telel the difference betweene the ttwo but if it looks equally at both, it cannot

Question 13

what does the habittuation paradigm assess

Answer 13

the infants ability to discriminate b/w sttimuli

Question 14

what is the habituation phase

Answer 14

repeatedly present infant with a stimulus until they habituate to it

Question 15

explain the teset of the habituation paradigm

Answer 15

present thee habituated “old” stimulus with a new stim

if the baby changse its reaction to the new stimulus (dishabittuation), it can tell the difference between the two

Question 16

what does it mean if the baby looks at both objects equally in the habituation paradigm

Answer 16

it means they cannot disttinguish between the 2

Question 17

what is the def of visual acuity

Answer 17

sharpness of visual discrimination

Question 18

how is visual acuity asseessed in children

Answer 18

by preseention a successtion of paddles with increasingly narrower stripes and narrowing gaps betweeen them until tthee infanct can no longer disgttinguish between srtipped paddle and plain gray one

Question 19

true or false: at birth, infants have poor visual acuity

Answer 19

truee

Question 20

since infants have poor visual acuity, do they prefeer tto look att images with high or low visual contrastt

Answer 20

high

Question 21

true or false: infants are capable of distinguishing between stim with lower and highere sensitivities

Answer 21

false, they dont discriminate bettween stim with lower contrast sensitivities

Question 22

be able to undersatnd the visual acuity witth paddles ttest

Answer 22

good

Question 23

why do infants have poor visual acuity when they are younger

Answer 23

due to the immaturity of the cone cells in infants retina (light sensitve neurons involved in seeing fine details and colours)

Question 24

when do chuldren develop adult like acuity

Answer 24

at 8 months

Question 25

true or false: at 7 months, children have adult like acuity

Answer 25

false, 8 months

Question 26

be able to disinguish between diffeerent moths and the development of visual acuity

Answer 26

,

Question 27

what is the colour perception at 1 month

Answer 27

black and white

Question 28

what is the colour perception at 2 month

Answer 28

colour vision appears

Question 29

what is the colour perception at 5 month

Answer 29

perceive colour categories simular to adults

Question 30

when do infants see black and white

Answer 30

1 month

Question 31

when do infants have colour vision appeaer

Answer 31

2 months

Question 32

when do infants perceive colour categories similar to adults

Answer 32

5 months

Question 33

do infants categorize colour the same way adults true?

Answer 33

kinda,, they are able to distinguish thee diff btween green vs purple but not to change in colour. within the same cateogry

Question 34

trtue or false: from birth, infants can scan their visual environment and pause to look at something threfore ehave no issue tracking moving stim

Answer 34

false infants can scan their visual environment and pause to look at something BUTTT they have troublee tracking moving stim

Question 35

why do infants have trouble tracking moving stimuli

Answer 35

bcause eye movements are ejereky

Question 36

at what age are infants able to smoothly track slow moving objects

Answer 36

4 motnhs

Question 37

at what age do infants deevelop adult like visual scanning (smoothly follow objeects)

Answer 37

8 montths

Question 38

what is the quality of tracking stim as a new born

Answer 38

have trouble tracking moving stimuli because eye movements aree too jerky

Question 39

what is the quality of tracking stim as a 4 momth old

Answer 39

smoothly ttrack slow moving objects

Question 40

what is the quality of tracking stim as a 8 month old

Answer 40

they have adult like visual scanning and can smoothly follow objects

Question 41

wha causes improved visual scanning from infant to 8 months

Answer 41

brain maturation

Question 42

why is the ability to visual scan important

Answer 42

because it is one of the few ways that infants have control over what they observe and learn (ability to be autonomous for baby) active child)

Question 43

true or false: newborns show a preference for faces (face like stim)_ overe non face like stim

Answer 43

true e

Question 44

do infants prefeer right side up faces or invereted

Answer 44

right side up

Question 45

explain why there was a hypothesis that there was a special face preception mechanism

Answer 45

because there is a part of the brain in the temporal cortex (fusiform face area) specialized in facial reconigztion

Question 46

what is the hypothesis for why infants are drawn to faces

Answer 46

infants have a general bias for sttim that are more "top heavy" vs bottom heavy

Question 47

how did they prove that baboese have a bias for top haevy stim

Answer 47

used preferential looking paradigm and showed reg faces, upside faces, scrambled top heaevy and scrambled body heavy

Question 48

if faces were "special" ie (innate mechanisms) what should the beehavior of the baby be when shown the 4 different faces

Answer 48

the babies should always prefer to look at the upright non scrambled face

Question 49

if faces were not special ie (general bias for top heavy mechanisms) what should the beehavior of the baby be when shown the 4 different faces

Answer 49

babies should prefer upright face AND scrambled top heaevy faces (with no preference btween thee two)

Question 50

true or false: there was a preef for the upright fac eovere the upside down facee

Answer 50

true

Question 51

was thtere a prefernecee for top heavy scrambled or bottom heavy

Answer 51

top heavy

Question 52

what was the behavior of babies when shown the upright face AND the top heavy config next to each other

Answer 52

there was no preference bettween the two showing that the preference for the faces simply result of general preference for stimuli that are top heavy rathere than bottom heavu (ie no special mechanism)

Question 53

tru or false: babies cannot recognize mom;s face

Answer 53

false, they quickly learn how to recognize and prefer and only a few days after birtth, babies prefer theeir mothers face compored to otther women

Question 54

what happens over the 1st year of life in terms of faces

Answer 54

infants become face specialists

Question 55

what does it mean to say that infants become facial specialists over the first year of life

Answer 55

meaens they are better at distinguishinh between faces thatt are frequently experienced in ttheir enviroment

Question 56

do. we have the same ability to distinguish between monkey faces as we do for humans

Answer 56

no , we have a harder ttime distinguishng beween money faces beacuse they are nott part of our normal enviroment

Question 57

what is the evidence that oveer the first year of lifee, infants become face specialists

Answer 57

9 montths old and adults can distinguish between human faces but struggle to distinguish between 2 monkey faces whereas 6 month olds are equally good at disttinguishing human and monkey faces (generalis)

Question 58

true or false: at 6 montths, infants are face specialistst

Answer 58

false, they are generalists at tthis point at 9 months they are specialists

Question 59

what is perceptual narrowing

Answer 59

tuning of perceptual mechanisms to the specific sensory inpits that infants eencountre in their daily lifee (will specialize in things you se eoften)

Question 60

explain percepttual narrowing.

Answer 60

there is a decline in the ability to distinguish stimuli that ar enot present or relevant to the infants enviromentt

Question 61

what is perceptual narrowing the reseult of

Answer 61

synapttic pruning

Question 62

exeplain synaptic prunning

Answer 62

During synaptic pruning, the brain eliminates extra synapses. = not wastee neural ressourceese on distinguishing non important things not in our normal environemnt

Question 63

what are some examples/evidencee of perceptual narrowing in face perception

Answer 63

infants becoming face specialists infants demonstrate the other race effect

Question 64

what is the other race effect

Answer 64

people find it easier to distinguish between faces of individuals from their own. racial group rather than between faces from tother racial groups

Question 65

explain how they showed otther face effect in infactns

Answer 65

got caucasian kids and habituated them to their own face or to another face and then presented the habituated face wih a new face from the same ratte results= 3 months old: distinguish between faces of all faces 9 months old: can only distinguish between faces of own race

Question 66

what were the results of the other race effect tese

Answer 66

3 months old: can distinguish between facse of all races 9 months old: can only distinguish between faces of their own race

Question 67

what is the other race effect evidence of

Answer 67

perceptual narrowing

Question 68

what is the face specialists evidence of

Answer 68

perceptal narrowing

Question 69

is the other race effect innate and why or why not

Answer 69

not innate but rather due to exporsure effect during few months of life, 96% of faces that babies are exposed to are to females of their own race

Question 70

trtue or false: even if iinfant is equally exposed to faces of different races, they will still show other race efefect

Answer 70

false, they will not show ORE

Question 71

is facial perceptin in ASD kids tthe same as normal ?

Answer 71

no , ASD have difficulty with face perception (rathre not look at eyes) -

Question 72

true or false: toddlers with ASD preefere to look at people over shapese

Answer 72

false, othere way around (

Question 73

if infants have prefererence for non faces, what could this be an indidcator of

Answer 73

ASD

Question 74

true or false: from birth, infatnts have a preference. for faces, especially their mothers

Answer 74

true

Question 75

is face preference innate

Answer 75

no it is not innate but rather a result of general preference for top heavy stimuli

Question 76

true or false: at 8 months, infants become face speecialists as a result of the other race effect

Answer 76

falsee, 9 months and perceptual narrowing