Meltzoff and Moore - imitation in infancy

Question 1

Background - Piaget

Answer 1

1. capacity for imitation develops gradually
2. 0-6 months very little capacity for imitation
3. 8-10 months progress in ability for imitation
4. 9-10 months interpretation of behaviours as imitative are illusionary
5. 18-24 months delayed imitation emerges

Question 1

Background - Piaget’s observation from his daughter

Answer 1

1. 5 months - tongue protrusion, continued while father did the same
   however association was only temporary
2. later suggestions by Piaget did not lead to tongue protrusion
3. 6 months - if Piaget waved goodbye, stuck out his tongue, put his thumb in his mouth had no reaction
4. Piaget suggested this was because the first movement did not correspond to known schema, other movements involved parts of her face she couldn’t see (inter-modal matching)
5. Intermodal matching - the ability to recognise an object initially inspected with one modality via another modality
6. Concluded 0-8 months there’s little imitation in first 6-8 months, infants can imitate actions already in their repertoire, inability for intermodal matching
7. 8 months - establishing of connections between what child sees on model and cannot see on herself, child began making slight noise with saliva from friction on lips, piaget imitated, child watched attentively, father stop and child imitated
8. 18-24 months - capacity for deferred imitation, jacqueline imitates a friend a day later
9. <8 months - infants may seem to imitate, but first true imitation is 8-10 months, infants can imitate novel gestures
10. • 18 months - capacity for representation appears, deferred imitation is possible

Question 2

Background - Meltzoff

Answer 2

1. Infants imitative competence is underestimated
2. Infants much younger can imitate facial and manual gestures

Question 3

Meltzoff and Moore, 1977

Answer 3

1. Aim - show that infants from a very young age can imitate, emphasised true imitation vs global arousal response, controlling child-parent interaction, experimenter bias
2. True imitation vs global response - each infants response to a gesture is compared to their response to another similar gesture, same adult, same distance, same rate of movement

Question 4

Experiment 1

Answer 4

1. 6 infants, 12-17 days old
2. Experimenter presents infant with passive face - unreactive, lip closed, neutral facial expression, 90 second period
3. Infant is then shown 4 gestures in random order - lip protrusion, mouth opening, tongue protrusion, sequential finger movement, 15 seconds each
4. 20 second response period - experimenter stops and resumes passive face
5. Findings - undergrad volunteers record response period, 6 coders for facial responses, 6 for finger movement, ranked frequency, gesture shown to infant - imitated most, imitation of other gestures remained

Question 5

Experiment 2

Answer 5

1. 12 infants, 16-32 days
2. Aim to see if experimenter was imitating infant
3. Infant sucjed on dummy and experimenter showed passive face
4. Dummy removed for 150 second baseline period
5. Dummy inserted, experimenter showed gesture 15 seconds, mouth opening, tongue protrusion on the side (no evolutionary basis)
6. Dummy removed, 150 second response period with experimenter with passive face
7. Findings - undergraduate coders, blind to experiment, ranked frequency of gestures shown by infant, neonates imitated both tongue protrusion and mouth opening

Question 6

Conclusions

Answer 6

1. Early accounts of imitation underestimate age
2. Infants imitate gestures from 12 days old
3. Even in lack of outside influences - contrary to behaviourist view

Explanations:
1. Innate releasing mechanism - Lorenz and Tinbergen, gestures are fixed-action patterns that are released by a sign stimulus (corresponding adult gesture), reflex like response, matching occurs for a few evolutionary privileged structures, response is fixed and stereotypic, matching response is time-locked to triggering display
2. Disproved - range of gestures were imitated, not time locked, not fixed and stereotypic, not just tongue protrusion, later evidence with the tongue protrusion on the side
3. Active intermodal mapping - imitation is intentional, goal directed intermodal matching, imitation is matching-to-target process, infants self produced movements provide proprioceptive feedback that can be compared with visual target, infant can compare sensory information from its own unseen behaviour with supramodal representation, infant constructs a match - imitation
4. Early learning from social interaction - social identification, mimicry has been shown to increase liking and prosocial tendencies in the imitated person

Question 7

Impact and legacy - developmental changes

Answer 7

1. Follow up study - Gergely et al -14 month olds, infants observe an adult switching on a light box with her head, adults hands are occupied or free, in the hands occupied condition the infants tended to switch on the light box with their hands, in the hands free condition they tended to switch it on with their heads, infants reasoned that the adults must have intended to use head as hands were free hence rational imitation
2. Follow up study - Buttleman et al - enculturated chumps, replicated Gergely’s method in the hands occupied condition the chimps used their hands, in hands free they used their heads, chimps als engaged in rational imitation

Question 8

Impact and legacy - scientific contributions

Answer 8

1. Implications in cognitive science - memory and its development
2. Implications for early education and parenting - importance of role models
3. Implications for brain science - common coding of action and mirror neurons
4. Mirror neurons - premotor neuron that fires both when an animal acts and when an animal observes an action being performed, found in monkeys and humans, helps our understanding of theory of mind, empathy

Question 9

Debate and controversy - mixed findings

Answer 9

1. Piaget and later researchers - no convincing evidence for imitation until 8 months
2. Meltzoff and moore - infants born with innate ability for imitation
3. Meltzoff and Moore 1994 - 6 week old infants, adult produces tongue protrusion to the side, tongue protrusion and mouth opening, 24 hours later, same adult with passive face, found infants produce same gesture

Question 10

debate and controversy - replicability

Answer 10

Oostenbroeack et al - 100 young infants, imitation is by product of arousal