TEST 2 Flashcards
1
Q
What are the 4 mental state concepts?
A
think
believe
know
want
2
Q
Mental states are ________________ and have to be ________________.
A
invisible
inferred
3
Q
We think about other people’s minds _______________ and __________.
What is an example of this?
A
naturally and easily
animation with circle and triangles - With this animation we automatically:
-try to turn it into a narrative with characters
-take simple stimuli and turn it into rich characters with mental states
4
Q
We develop the ability to think about other people’s thoughts, beliefs, and emotions (i.e., mental states) naturally and easily without ____________!
A
being taught
5
Q
How do infants start to reason about others’ goals, desires, and beliefs? - This is a big question. What are the major theories?
A
Piaget’s theory (general knowledge and experience)
Core-knowledge theories:
-Nativists: Domain-specific core knowledge systems
-Constructivists: Naive theories
6
Q
Piaget believed that children enter the world equipped with only __________________ abilities that allow them to increase their understanding of all types of _____________.
A
general learning
content
7
Q
Core-knowledge theories view children as having __________________ abilities and ______________________ mechanisms that allow them to _____________ and ________________ acquire information of __________________ importance.
A
general learning
specialized learning
quicky and effortlessly
evolutionary
8
Q
Core-knowledge theorists believe that children are _______________ products of _______________.
A
well-adapted
evolution
9
Q
What is the disagreement between members of core-knowledge theorists?
What do they agree about?
A
how much knowledge is inborn
that development reflects general AND domain-specific learning mechanisms
10
Q
What do nativist core-knowledge theories emphasize?
A
innate knowledge; born with substantial knowledge of evolutionarily important domains AND the ability to quickly and easily acquire more knowledge in these domains
11
Q
What are the 4 core-knowledge systems that nativists believe are innate?
What is the fifth system that overlaps with the other domains (not domain specific)?
A
Inanimate objects
Minds of people and animals capable of goal-directed actions
Number
Spatial layouts and geometric relations
language
12
Q
What do nativists believe each innate system is for? What item could be used to represent this concept?
A
domain specific tools for survival
a Swiss Army Knife
13
Q
What do constructivist core-knowledge theories have in common with nativist theories?
A
believe that infants possess specialized learning abilities that allow them to quickly and effortlessly begin to understand domains of evolutionary importance
14
Q
How do constructivist core-knowledge theories differ from nativist theories?
A
believe infants’ initial knowledge is rudimentary & that more advanced knowledge reflects specific learning experiences within the domain
15
Q
Naive theories are what type of core-knowledge theory? What’s another term for naive theories?
A
constructivist
common sense theories
16
Q
Naive theorists believe that children are forming what 4 systems of knowledge (also known as naive theories):
A
Psychology (knowledge of people)
Biology (knowledge of plants)
Physics (knowledge of objects)
(Sociology – knowledge of social groups)
17
Q
What 3 characteristics do naive theories share with scientific theories?
A
-Ontological commitments
-Unobservable constructs
-Causal-explanatory reasoning
18
Q
What are ontological commitments?
A
- Identify fundamental units for dividing relevant objects, beings, and events into a few basic categories
- the kinds of entities that exist in a theories causal system
- e.g., 3 categories: people, other animals, nonliving things
(what the theory says exists)
19
Q
What are unobservable constructs? Example?
A
– explain observable events in terms of unobservable constructs
- e.g., goals
20
Q
What is causal-explanatory reasoning? What does it allow children to do? What is an example?
A
- explain many phenomena with a few fundamental principles
- allow children to interpret, predict, and explain events
- e.g., beliefs and desires cause individuals to act
21
Q
What is the ontological commitment for the naive theory of psychology?
A
Ontological commitment = animate beings with psychological concepts
22
Q
What are the unobservable constructs for the naive theory of psychology?
A
Unobservable constructs = mental states (beliefs, desires, goals)
23
Q
What is the causal-explanatory reasoning for the naive theory of psychology?
A
Causal-explanatory reasoning = desires, beliefs, actions
24
Q
According to naive psychology, we use what 3 concepts to understand people, predict others’ actions and guide our interactions?
A
desires –> beliefs –> actions
25
What do we use to predict others' actions?
desires and beliefs
26
What do we use others' actions for?
To inform/infer mental states (beliefs and desires)
27
Can we have mental states (know, think, believe, and want) without being able to reason about them?
Yes - e.g., in infancy
28
What is the origin of social knowledge?
face perception - crucial to identifying caregivers and is adaptive
29
Face perception is...
What is an example of this?
quick, automatic and intuitive
we find faces even where they don't exist
30
Do newborns perceive faces? What study was done on this? How old? What were the results? What do these results provide evidence for?
Paddle/newborn study:
1-hour-old neonates
Each display starts in front, moves slowly left or right
Measure - how far with the newborn turn to follow it?
Three paddles used: face, scrambled, blank
Results: found that there is a preference for "top-heavy" patterns - even in non-faces
This simple bias leads babies to look at faces
Provides support for the theory that face perception is innate
31
Do fetuses display the "top-heavy" preference (face perception)? What study was done on this? What were the results? What does this tell us?
3rd trimester study using ultrasound with lights on belly
M = 240 day-old-fetuses
4D ultrasound to measure head turning
3 lights (either two on top and one on bottom or vice versa)
Results: turned farther for/preferred top-heavy condition
There is a predisposition for top-heavy patterns that does not require postnatal experience with faces (innateness)
32
Can newborns discriminate between biological and random motion? What study was done on this? How old? What were the results? What does this tell us?
Dots moving (based on hen, random and upside-down hen)
1-3 day old neonates
Results: looked longer at biological conditions (hen and upside-down hen) but preferred hen walking upright to upside-down
They can discriminate between biological and non-biological and prefer what is biologically normal
33
What do the results of the face perception and motion studies tell us?
Newborn infants have innate perceptual biases that allow them to find and attend to social stimuli (faces, biological motion)
Early attention to social stimuli helps jump-start social learning
34
Do infants have social concepts before they can talk? How do we know?
Yes
They can distinguish between things that are animate (people, animals, etc.) and inanimate objects
35
How do nativists and constructivists each explain how infants can distinguish between animate and inanimate things?
Nativists: core knowledge systems for inanimate objects & minds of people and animals
Constructivists: naïve theories of psychology and biology
36
How do infants decide whether something is animate?
visual features: face, shape, texture
dynamic cues: does it move on its own (self-propelled), does it respond to its environment (contingent behaviour)
37
Do infants make different predictions about what animate agents vs. inanimate objects will do? Do they know that animate agents have goals? What study was done on this? What were the results? What does that tell us?
Hand reaching for ball or doll study
6-month infants
voe design
Video 1 - hand reaching for ball - habituation
Novel video 1 - hand reaches for doll (different goal)
Novel video 2 - hand reaches for a different location but the same goal (ball)
Novel video 3 - hand reaches for a different location and a different goal
= if infant understands goals then the novel videos with different goals would have longer looking time (voe)
This was the result - different goals = longer looking time
38
What was the follow-up experiment in the hand reaching for item series?
Used stick/claw instead of a hand to test whether the infants would attribute goals to the inanimate object.
6 month old
If the infants don't attribute goals to the inanimate objects then the looking time will be equal when "goal" is changed
This was the result - same looking time for:
same location/different goal
different location/same goal
different location/different goal
Together with previous study this indicates that infants attribute goals to hands (animate) but not to claw (inanimate)
Animate agents have goals 🡪 influences expectations
39
Do 3 month olds have the same results as the 6 month olds in the hand reaching study? Why might this be?
No - 3 month olds had equal time for all conditions
They do not attribute reaching as a goal-directed behaviour because they are not at a physical development point of being able to reach for things themselves.
40
Does motor experience matter when learning goal-directed behaviour? How do we know?
Yes
Velcro mitten study - training 3-month-olds with velcro mittens to achieve reaching goal
Resulted in voe results similar to the 6-months-olds in the hand-reaching study
3-mo who are trained to pick up objects treat the reaching action of another person as goal directed
41
By 1 year, infants know a lot about goals and expect agents to act ______________.
rationally
(take the shortest/easiest path toward their goal)
42
How do we know that infants expect agents to act rationally in goal-directed behaviour? At what age?
the wall-jump experiment
12-month-olds
habituated to a big ball jumping over the wall to get to another smaller ball
when the wall disappears, infants should expect the big ball to go directly (not jump) if they think it is the most efficient way even though it is a new (novel) action
This was the result = they understood that the ball had a goal and should’ve moved toward the goal in an efficient way
43
Is all goal-directed learning done early in childhood?
No - there is developmental change in childhood
e.g., theory of mind
44
what is ToM?
the ability to attribute beliefs, intentions, desires, knowledge and other mental states to other people
& understand that others’ mental states can be different from one’s own and/or reality
45
If you tell a toddler (age 2):
1 - They are searching for crayons.
2 - They found a mitten.
3 - And then ask them if they will they keep looking for crayons?
They will answer YES - can do simple desire reasoning to ascertain that a mitten has not fulfilled the desire.
46
At age 3 how is the child's reasoning about beliefs and actions?
Age 3
They are able to consider beliefs but are limited
e.g., “Why is Billy looking for his dog?”
“He thinks his dog ran away”
- false belief tasks are more difficult
47
Why is the false belief task difficult for 3-year-olds?
They expect people to act according to reality (as they know it)
If 3-year-olds know reality, they will predict that everyone will act on that reality regardless of their belief/knowledge of the reality
48
What are the two main false belief tasks?
Sally-Ann doll task
Deceptive container task
49
What two results does the deceptive container task show for 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds?
-3 year old will fail the task AND say that they always knew there were pencils in the box
-4 year old will pass the task AND will acknowledge that they originally believed there were Smarties in the box
50
What do we know about cross-cultural research on ToM development? What 5 countries have been studied?
Similar findings across 5 cultures (Canada, India, Peru, Thailand, Samoa):
- 3-year-olds poor performance
- 5-year-olds good performance
51
What three factors are known to contribute to ToM development?
Executive Function
- inhibit the dominant response of own beliefs
Social interaction
- securely attached mothers use more mental state language
- children with older or many siblings have better ToM (e.g., conflicts)
Language and verbal reasoning
- children with better language abilities perform better on false belief tasks (bidirectional?)
52
How does experience contribute to ToM development? What study?
- 14-year-olds who gained experience acting in plays over the course of a school year showed greater understanding of other people’s thinking at the end of the year than before their acting experience
- peers who received other types of arts education (music or visual arts) over the same period did not show comparable improvements
53
What is the hypothesized brain mechanism devoted to understanding other people?
Theory of Mind Module (TOMM)
54
What is the rate of ASD?
1 in 100 children (mostly male)
55
What are the main symptoms of ASD?
impairment in social interaction and communication
restricted and repetitive patterns of behaviour
56
What were the results of false belief tasks for ASD and typically developing children matched for cognitive ability? What were the results/ages?
Typical: 23 of 27 got 100% right (M age = 4.5yos)
ASD: 16 of 20 got 100% wrong (M age = 11yo)
(the 4 children who passed were 10-15yo)
57
What do children expect when group membership/social affiliations conflict
with mental states? What study shows this? What age range?
Flurp/Zaz study
By age 3, children believe people are more likely to harm members of different social groups instead of their own. But … what do they expect will happen when an individual is mad at an ingroup member?
Experiment with green group (Flurps) and blue group (Zazzes)
-children are told that the Flurp is really mad at another Flurp.
-The Flurp hit someone - did he hit the Flurp or the Zaz?
Results - those with high ToM said he hit the Flurp but those with low ToM said he hit the Zaz
3-4-year-olds’ tendency to use individual level information (mental states) over category-level information (group membership) is related to their ToM
58
What was the Johnson, Slaughter, & Carey (1988) study about? What were the ages? What were the methods? What were the results? What is the Take-Home message?
Do infants follow the gaze of others because they attribute intentions to them?
Which characteristics of entities with minds might infants be sensitive to?
(e.g., presence of eyes, asymmetric body shape, contingent or goal-directed behavior, self-generated behavior or movement)
Q: Would infants follow the gaze of non-person entities that have qualities of intentional beings:
- face
- contingent behavior
12 month olds
Results:
A face is enough alone for infants to attribute intentions/animacy
Contingent behaviour alone is enough as well.
No face and no contingent behaviour is not enough.
Q: Was the person in the study the only condition where infants followed gaze?
NO!
Q: Which cues were infants sensitive to?
Infants followed the gaze in all object conditions except
when it didn’t have a face & wasn’t behaving contingently
TAKE HOME: By 12-months, it’s an entity’s intentions that drive infants to follow its “gaze”
59
ToM: stages of development - what happens at age 2?
age 3?
age 4?
Age 2: engage in simple desire reasoning
Age 3: engage in belief-desire reasoning
Age 4: understand false beliefs
60
What is ToM a good example for?
Good example of stage theory development! Does not seem to happen gradually
61
Do we know for sure that language has an effect on ToM?
No, we only know that there is a correlation - could be bidirectional
62
What are concepts?
General ideas or understandings that can be used to group together objects, events, qualities, etc. that are similar in some way
Infinite similarity = infinite concepts
similar shape (all football fields are rectangular)
similar materials (all diamonds are compressed carbon)
similar size (all skyscrapers are tall)
similar taste (all lemons are sour)
… colors, function … etc.
63
What do concepts help us to do?
Help us understand the world because they allow us to generalize from prior experiences
Life without concepts = every situation would be new
64
What are the two groups of fundamental concepts? What dimensions do we use to break down the second fundamental concept?
1. used to categorize the kinds of things that exist in the world:
- e.g., humans, living things, inanimate objects and their properties
2. involves dimensions used to represent our experiences:
- space (where the experience occurred)
- time (when it occurred)
- number (how many times it occurred)
- causality (why it occurred)
65
Children divide objects into what 3 categories?
Inanimate objects
People
Other animals
66
What is the difference between a category and a concept?
Category: collection of instances that are treated the same
Concept: refers to all the knowledge one has about a category
e.g., Infants find simlilarities and differences - categories - e.g., humans
concept - e.g., understanding what it means to be human
67
Different types of concepts apply to different _________________. What is an example of this?
Categories
Height
Weight
Color
Size
Texture
etc.
-all apply to the three categories that children divide objects into (inanimate objects, people and other animals)
Eat
Drink
Grow
Breathe
-only apply to some categories (not all)
68
What are the 2 important uses of categories?
1. Allows children to draw accurate inferences about unfamiliar entities
(e.g., child may not have ever encountered a platypus but if they know it's an animal, they can attribute the concepts they know about that category (animals) to understand the platypus)
2. Helps children further categorize and form category hierarchies
(understand how things are related to each other)
69
What are category hierarchies? What is their importance?
Categories organized according to set-subset relations
(help children make finer distinctions among things within each level)
70
Infants frequently use perceptual categorization
- what is it?
grouping together objects that have similar appearances
71
What is the difference between the animal categories that 4-month-olds and 6-month-olds form?
4-month-olds can form specific animal categories: habituate to general category of cats & dishabituate to dogs - dishabituation showed that they saw the dog as a separate category - different from category of cat
6-month-olds form more general
categories
- habituated to different types of
mammals (dogs, zebras, elephants)
- dishabituated to birds and fish
72
The 4- and 6-month olds categorize animals (shown in dishabituation studies) based on what?
perceptual similarities
73
What are the three levels of the hierarchy of categories? What is the difference between them?
Superordinate 🡪 general
Basic 🡪 medium/in-between
Subordinate 🡪 very specific
differ in how specific they are
74
The basic level has a number of what? What does knowing this level do for children? What are some examples of basic level categories?
Basic level category has a number of consistent characteristics
Knowing this level helps them understand the other two
Child might know that cows are all similar to each other and might know than cows are different from different animals like rabbits and dogs.
They might know that chairs and tables are different from each other
If things are similar enough, they will create a category for it
75
What are some examples of superordinate categories? How do parents help children develop these categories?
animals (superordinate category for cows, rabbits and dogs)
furniture (superordinate category for chairs and tables)
Parents will help children develop superordinate categories by using their knowledge of basic categories
76
The superordinate level category has ________ consistent characteristics than the basic category. Does this make them easier or more difficult to group together?
fewer (e.g., size, shapes, colors)
more difficult
77
What are some examples of subordinate categories? How do parents help children develop these categories?
poodles and german shepherds (subordinate to dogs)
coffee tables and kitchen tables (subordinate to tables)
Parents will help children develop subordinate levels using knowledge of basic level.
78
The subordinate level category has _______ consistent characteristics than the basic level that are relatively ____________ to discriminate.
more
difficult
They are more difficult because they are very similar to each other and differences are more difficult to notice.
79
What is another term for categorical hierarchies?
taxonomic
80
The basic level of categories shares _________ characteristics and is relatively ______ to discriminate.
many
easy
81
What study examined the development of conceptual preference for either thematic or taxonomic relationships? What were the findings?
“Choose the picture that goes best with the [target]”
target = dog
thematic = bone
taxonomic = cat
Children age 3-7 years categorize using thematic relations
Children age 9-11 years & college students categorize using taxonomic relations
Elderly (M=72 years) categorize using thematic relations
82
What study examined the understanding of sets and subsets (categorical hierarchies)? What were the findings? What does this suggest?
Are there more roses or flowers?
same basic level = flowers
superordinate = plants
subordinate = roses/daisies
There are more flowers (basic level) but young children will say there are more roses than flowers (larger sub class) is greater than total class
failure suggests young children don’t understand “rose” is subordinate to flower (They are seeing roses and flowers as part of the same basic level)
83
Knowledge of living things: at age _______, most children understand that plants, grow, heal themselves, and die...
but not until age _____ do they realize that plants are living things.
Why is this?
At what age do children realize that plants bend towards light, grow roots towards water?
What is a factor that can contribute to children developing this knowledge earlier?
4-5
7-9
perhaps because children equate living with moving in adaptive ways to promote survival, but plants move too slowly to observe
age 5
Living in rural areas = earlier than children in cities or suburbs
84
What three things do children begin to understand about living things between ages 4-10?
inheritance - understand that physical characteristics tend to be passed from parent to offspring - children will predict that offspring will have similar characteristics
growth - directional (smaller to bigger), because of an internal process
illness - e.g., germs cause illness
85
Do preschoolers understand that certain aspects are determined by heredity rather than environment? How do we know this?
yes
4-7-yrs know that an animal raised by parents of another species will become an adult of its own species
86
What limitation is there on 6-10-year-olds' understanding of living things?
6-10-yrs fail to understand one main difference between artifacts and living things/natural kinds:
- artifacts are made by people, serve specific purposes
- living things/natural kinds are not created by people for a
purpose
(e.g., rivers were created for animals to live in rather than created because icebergs melted)
87
When children aged 6-10 are asked, “Why does a [living thing/ natural kind exist]?” what will they refer to? What is this called?
children refer to a function or purpose
Promiscuous teleology - viewing all kinds of entities (artifacts and natural objects) as existing for a purpose
88
What are the two main theories of concepts?
classic view
prototype (& family resemblance)
89
What is the classic view of concepts?
All concepts have necessary and sufficient features (something either has the requisite features and belongs in the category or it does not)
90
What are the two types of features in classic view?
necessary = needed to belong to a category
sufficient = when combined together, could make it true
91
What are the necessary and sufficient features of a triangle?
necessary = internal angles sum to 180
sufficient = has 3 sides
has straight lines
92
What is the problem with the classic view of concepts? What are some examples?
Concepts apply to things that meet the necessary and sufficient conditions BUT there’s no sharp definition
- cases of ambiguity – not clear whether something belongs to a category
(e.g., chapstick - is it a health product or makeup) (e.g., is a hot dog a sandwich?) (e.g., is cheesecake a cake or a pie?)
93
The classic view of concepts shifted from necessary and sufficient features to what?
characteristic-to-defining features
94
What is the difference between characteristic features and defining features?
Typical, features you usually think about/consider
features that are necessary
95
Younger children often rely on _______________ features, but overlook _____________ features (e.g., 4 year old)
Older children use ____________ features, and can ignore ____________ features (e.g., 9 year old)
characteristic features
defining features
defining features
characteristic features
96
What is the prototypes and family resemblances view of concepts? What is an example?
satisfy a sufficient number of features (where some may be weighed more than others)
- some features are not necessary
e.g., birds - not all features are necessary (flying, webbed feet) - but some features will overlap
97
Prototypes & Family resemblances
- Category members have ___________________ features
- some members share _______ features with others.
- some members share _______ features
No combination of features is _________ or ___________
partially overlapping
many
few
necessary or sufficient (no combination of features common to all members)
98
What is a problem with prototype theories? What is this called?
transformation stories - the raccoon/skunk story (after transforming into a skunk, is it a raccoon or a skunk?)
essentialism - the belief that living things have an essence inside them that makes them what they are
Put differently,
- things have an underlying nature that one cannot directly observe
-viewed as being inherited from one's parents
99
When presented with the raccoon/skunk transformation story, what ages will believe it is now a skunk? What ages will believe it is still a raccoon?
Preschool children (~4) = believe it’s a skunk
Older children (~7) and adults = believe it’s a raccoon
100
In what sort of transformation story would older children and adults believe the transformation had really taken place?
When it is an artifact category (e.g., coffee pot to bird feeder) - there is no essence and it can be changed (as opposed to a natural category like an animal)
101
What is an implication of essentialism? What is an example of this?
By age __ children rely on ____________ rather than ______________.
Essentialism leads to making inferences/predictions
This bat eats bugs.
This bird (flamingo) eats plants.
What does this bird (black bird) eat?
perceptual features = bugs
category info = plants
Children (by age 4) rely on category, not appearance
102
What is the main difference between classic and prototype theories?
beliefs about features
103
What are the fundamental concepts involving dimensions we use to represent our experiences?
number (how many times it occurred)
causality (why it occurred)
space (where the experience occurred)
time (when it occurred)
104
What is numerical equality?
all sets of N objects have something in common
105
How young do infants understand numerical equality? How do we know?
2-day-old infants
Syllables and dots study
heard a set of syllables - familiarized to the number in the set
then saw the displays on the screen
looked longer at set that was the same as set that they heard - shows that they are mapping what they are hearing to what they are seeing (set sizes)
Understand abstract numerical quantities across different modalities
106
What happened when the syllable/dots study was done with smaller ratios of syllables to dots? What happened with older infants?
Newborns show a ratio-dependent numerical understanding/ number discrimination (3:1 but not 2:1)
6 months: discriminate 2:1
9 months: discriminate 3:2
adulthood: 8:7
107
How do we know that infants have a concept of addition/subtraction? How old? Paradigm?
5 months old
Object(s) placed, screen comes up, objected added or subtracted, screen comes down
reveals expected number of objects or unexpected number of objects
infants looked longer at unexpected (voe design)
108
It is proposed that there are two different mechanisms (magnitude systems) in infants for numbers. What are they?
1. approximate number system - handles large numbers, but only approximately
one is larger than other one - you don't need to count to know
2. parallel individuation system - precisely track a few individuals (e.g., mental pointers)
109
What are the 5 counting principles?
1. stable order: numbers should always be recited in same order
2. One-to-one correspondence: each object must be labelled by a single number
3. Cardinality: last number in the set corresponds to the last number stated
4. Abstraction: any set of discrete objects or events can be counted (and a set doesn't have to be the same object - e.g., you can count the amount of objects on a table, they don't all need to be the same object)
5. Order irrelevance: count left to right, right to left, etc.
110
Of the 5 counting principles, the first ___ are _____________ and the last ___ do what?
first 3 - essential
last 2 - help strengthen
111
Do children all over the world learn numbers at the same rate? Why?
NO, By age 5, children in China can count to 100 (or more)
North American 5-year-olds can’t count that high
easier pattern to learn in Chinese - English counters need to learn each number individually up to 19
112
What is the Give-a-Number task (Give-N)?
Ask for a specific number of something and see if they can perform the task
113
What is a pre-number knower or non-knower?
can do the count list but can't perfom the Give-N task (don't yet have an understanding of one)
114
What are the knower stages of the Give-N task?
non-knower
1-Knower
2-Knower
3-Knower
4-Knower
Cardinal-Principle Knower
115
What happens when children become cardinal-principle knowers?
they start to understand the cardinal principle so they become cardinal-principle knowers (also knows that they can add to a set to get to a certain number without having to start counting from one again)
116
Do children across cultures become number-knowers/cardinal principle knowers at the same ages? Some examples?
No, progression among cultures is about the same but at different ages
US = cardinal principle knower at about age 4
Japanese children are becoming 2-knowers and cardinal principle knowers earlier than US
Children from Tsimane progress much later due to cultural differences
117
What are the 4 early object concepts?
solidity, continuity, gravity and support
118
What are solidity and continuity?
state of being solid
consistent existence of something over time and space
119
What is some evidence that infants have concepts of solidity and continuity? What do they expect/not expect? Age of continuity study?
Infants expect objects to continue to exist in time and space
Infants do not expect different objects to occupy the same space at the same time
solidity - study with Minnie dolls - two-week older infant could infer that two objects were being used - know that continue to exist (can't beam from one place to another)
continuity - study with cart on tracks and box placed on tracks - 3.5 months - understand object permanence and understand that two objects can not occupy the same space at the same time
120
At what age do we know that infants understand physical causality? How do we know?
6- to 10- months
habituated to scene where moving object hit stationary object (car hit toy dinosaur) and stationary object moved
understanding of physical causality (reasoning about cause and effect)
saw test trial like habituation
or saw test trial where stationary object moved before being hit - looked longer at this (voe)
121
What are the ages of the 4 stages of understanding of support and gravity - study with objects on/beside box?
3 months: Contact / No contact
5 months: Type of contact
6 ½ months: Amount of contact
12 ½ months: Shape of object
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What gravity errors do 2-3-year-olds make? What was the study? At what age do they pass the most difficult levels of the test?
Opaque tubes (bent) with balls dropped
task - where did children look for ball - at location where the ball should end up (come out)? or at location directly beneath?
In order to succeed: children have to infer the trajectory of the ball from the shape of the opaque tube
They were judged to have passed task when they found the ball at the correct location on the first trial
3 levels of difficulty
2-3-year-olds: Fail to infer the trajectory from shape
Assume: falling objects travel a straight line
3-4 year-olds pass levels 2 and 3
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What were the two follow-up experiments for the tube/balls tasks? What did these tells us?
1. Transparent tubes: almost all children passed level 3 (tells us that the original results not due to motor/task demands or fatigue)
2. Training with transparent condition:
tested children who failed level 2 (opaque) 🡪 transparent 🡪 opaque
2/15 children passed opaque
can they carry knowledge on from training with transparent tubes to opaque tubes when they have successfully completed task with transparent? NO
124
How do nativists and empiricists differ in their explanations of infants' concept/learning of space? What do they agree on?
Nativists: children possess an innate module specialized for learning about space.
This spatial information processing is separate from other types of information.
Empiricists: spatial representation is a result of experience, like other behavior patterns.
Both agree that:
Spatial concepts are understood early in life.
Self-produced movement in the environment stimulates processing of spatial information.
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What do children understand about space early in life? What is this called?
Early in life, children understand the location of objects relative to their bodies (body-centered).
- Infants reach for objects closer to themselves.
Egocentric spatial representations: coding of spatial locations relative to one’s own body, without regard to the surrounding
126
At what age are infants capable of using landmarks in their environment to code the location of objects (going from being body-centered to using landmarks)?
6 months
127
Development of spatial skills depends on what two things? How do we know?
experience and culture
e.g., Indigenous children growing up in an Australian desert show better memory for spatial locations than children growing up in cities -need to be able to navigate themselves through space for survival (also do better on board games, etc.)
128
At what ages have infants been shown to make inferences about samples from populations (able to anticipate a probable outcome from pulling a sample of coloured balls from a population)? What does this indicate?
6-month-olds (but not 4-month-olds) looked longer at the improbable outcome
infants can make inferences about samples from populations
infants can make inferences from samples to populations
In order to use the statistical information, the infant needs to assume that the sample is randomly drawn from the population
perhaps employing basic principles of probability
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What did the Xu, F., & Denison, S. (2009) study investigate? What age? What were the conditions?
1) Are infants sensitive to the random sampling assumption?
2) Is this statistical inference mechanism a low-level, automatic mechanism or is it capable of integrating other sources of knowledge?
🡪 Can infants integrate intentional information (e.g., visual access, expressed preference) in this statistical inference task?
11-month-old infants
3 conditions:
- random sampling
- non-random sampling
- blindfold
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Xu & Denison (2009) - What were the steps taken in the study for each condition?
Random sampling condition:
1st step: familiarization trials (5:1 ratio red/white balls)
2nd step: preference phase:
moved one color over to the other box "look at these"
moved them back
moved the other color over to the other box "look at these"
not showing an actual preference - just in keeping with the other two conditions where there are preferences
3rd step: test trials (6)
closed her eyes,
turned her head away, and reached into the box
(either pulled 5 red or 5 white balls)
5th step: exposed population to infant
measured whether they looked longer at expected or unexpected
in this condition, infants’ expectations (looking times) should be based on the contents of the box
Non-random sampling condition:
1st step: same
2nd step: preference phase - showed preference for one color
3rd step: test trials (6) difference in this condition - she looked into the box (has visual access and a goal)
expectations should not depend on population/stats - they should be based on the preference of the experimenter - if the E pulls out the opposite color from the preference phase then that should have the longer looking time (unexpected)
Blindfold condition:
1st step: same
2nd step: same as non-random sampling condition (there is a preference)
3rd step: test trials (6) put a blindfold over her eyes and pulled out the sample
despite her expressed preference for a particular color ball, she did not have visual access to the content of the box during sampling - looking time should revert to the 1st condition (stats about the population) rather than the preference - infants would have to have stat understanding, override that with preference and then ignore that to revert to stat knowledge
131
Xu & Denison (2009) - What were the results? What do they suggest for each condition?
Random sampling condition:
longer looking times for unexpected (according to content of the box)
Suggests infants use statistical information to reason about populations from samples
Non-random sampling condition:
longer looking time for unexpected (according to preference)
Suggests infants can discard statistical information and use intentional information/mental states to form inferences
Blindfold condition:
longer looking time for unexpected (according to content of box)
Suggests infants can discard preferences depending on the person’s visual access and use statistical information to form inferences
132
At what age do infants show ability of simple arithmetic (addition, subtraction)?
At what age do infants show statistical knowledge (understanding relations between populations and samples)?
5 mos
6 mos
133
At ___ months, infants attribute goals to any entity they identify as _____________.
5
an agent
134
Language is a communication system in which ____________ number of signals (sounds, letters, gestures) can be combined according to agreed-upon rules to produce _____________ number of messages. What is this called?
a limited
an infinite
generativity
135
What are the two stages of language and what order do they normally take?
comprehension and then production
136
What are the 5 components of language?
phonology - smallest units of meaningful sound (/r/ or /l/)
morphemes - smallest units of meaning (base words, prefixes, suffixes, etc.)
syntax - set of rules for a language (grammar) (e.g., word order - SVO)
semantics - meaning (word meaning)
pragmatics - how language is used appropriately in different social contexts (sarcasm, rhetorical questions, tone)
137
What is it called when adults use modified speech with infants/young children?
Infant-directed speech (IDS) or Child-directed speech
also called parentese
138
What are the 4 characteristics of IDS and what are their purposes
emotional tone
exaggerated speech and facial expressions
---used to gain or maintain infant's attention
higher pitch, lots of intonation changes
slow, clear, elongated pauses
---used to help infants detect phonemes
139
What other languages have been shown to use IDS? What does this show?
Arabic
French
Italian
Japanese
Mandarin
Spanish
& signed languages
importance for language development
140
Are there cases in which IDS is not used? If IDS is not used, is there a language delay?
Yes,
Kaluli of Papua New Guinea:
- believe that infants cannot understand, so no reason for caregivers to talk to them
- mother speaks for them
- carried facing outwards
no language delay
141
How is SES correlated with language development? What study shows results on this?
Number of words children know (linked to) number of words they hear (linked to) caregiver’s vocabulary
Recorded speech that 42 parents used with their infants over 2 ½ years
Upper-middle class: 2,153 words per hour
Working class: 1,251 words per hour
Welfare: 616 words per hour
4 years = 45 million
4 years = 26 million
4 years = 13 million
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The number of words a child hears...
Predicts: ??
Affects: ??
Predicts the number of words children learn
- children from families with higher SES have larger vocabularies than those from lower SES families
Affects how quickly toddlers recognize familiar words
- children whose mothers talked more to them at 18mo were faster at recognizing words at 24mo than those whose mothers provided less input
143
Who studied technology and language learning (Baby Einstein videos, etc.)
Judy DeLoache
144
What was the technology and language study? Age? Groups? Results?
Parents and infants 12-18mo
randomly assigned to
4 groups:
- video with interaction (watched video with parent)
- video without interaction
- parent-teaching group (no video)
- control (no intervention)
(5 times per week)
parent-teaching group - parents given leeway to teach words however they wanted to
best learning was in parent-child interaction group
no difference between video w/o interaction and control
those using video w/interaction still learned less than parent-teaching group
parents who liked the DVD tended to overestimate how much the infant learned
145
What is the most recent screen time recommendation for the American Academy of Pediatrics for infants younger than 18 months?
live video chat is the only acceptable use of technology for infants younger than 18 months.
146
What is the most recent screen time recommendation for the American Academy of Pediatrics for infants 18-24 months?
Between 18 - 24 months, screen time should be limited to watching educational programs with a caregiver
147
What is the most recent screen time recommendation for the American Academy of Pediatrics for children 2-5 years old?
Children between 2-5 years, limit non-educational screen time to ~1 hour/weekday and 3 hours/weekend
148
How do children learn words? What are the two methods that work together?
Assumption:
Mutual exclusivity assumption
Methods of word learning:
Fast mapping
149
Mutual Exclusivity assumption - what is it? example?
Infants and children expect that an entity will only have one name
Children infer what a new word means by ruling out objects they already know
e.g., Where is the blicket? (two pictures - one of a duck, the other of something else)
150
Who is less likely to follow the mutual exclusivity assumption?
Bilingual and trilingual infants are less likely to follow the mutual exclusivity assumption
151
Fast mapping
method to rapidly learn new word in 1 exposure
process of rapidly learning a new word simply from hearing the contrastive use of a familiar and unfamiliar word
map novel label to novel object (especially when shown familiar object and novel referent/distractor)
152
How does race influence infants' speech processing? What study? How old? Specific characteristics of participants?
16-month-olds
monolingual English-learners
Caucasian
very minimal exposure to people who spoke a foreign language, had an accent or were of different race (approx 7% exposure).
saw one of these two people (one white, one other race) and then see these two objects (one familiar - dog, one not familiar) and then the question (phoneme change)
Question asked by person: Do you see the dog/dag?
would the infants map the novel words onto the correct entity or would they assume there's an accent making the phoneme change?
same-race speaker = using mutual-exclusivity assumption
other-race = no assumption (both dog/dag mapped to dog)
Infants interpreted the same words differently depending on which speaker they saw
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What does the dog/dag study tell us?
infants speech perception is influenced by social properties of the speaker
Expect familiar-race speakers to pronounce words in familiar ways
Understand that unfamiliar-race speakers may produce words in unfamiliar ways
expect new words to refer to new objects only within a language community / within group (using the mutual-exclusivity bias)
154
Non-linguistic symbols - primary function, examples
primary function = provide/signal useful information
Examples: photographs, drawings, emojis, maps
155
Using symbols requires what?
dual representation
156
dual representation: idea that a symbolic artifact must be mentally represented in what 2 ways at the same time? examples?
1) real object
2) a symbol for something other than itself
e.g., a physical map is a thing (a piece of paper) and is also representing places in space
e.g., an emoji (happy face) is a face/pic but also represents an emotional state
e.g., child's drawing is a thing but also represents something else that they have drawn
157
What study demonstrates that young children have trouble with dual representation? Age?
9mos treat pictured objects as if they were real objects
act as if the object in the pic is real - their actions towards it show this (e.g., they try to grab/grasp the depicted object)
simply don’t know what pictures are 🡪 they have to learn what a picture is and what it is not
158
At what age do children learn that pictures are to look at ((point, talk about), but not to feel or pick up?
- understand the symbolic nature of pictures
19 mos
159
What is the Snoopy Task? What does it test? What age(s)? Results?
Snoopy Task: Real room and small-scale model
Judy DeLoache
showed child scale model as the room next door
showed them little Snoopy figure and showed them where it was hidden - would represent big Snoopy in next room
could they reason that the small scale was a representation of the next door room?
2.5 years = no dual representation
3 years = dual representation
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What was the follow-up study to the Snoopy task? How did the result differ? Why? What age could pass this task?
Shrinking machine
something in room - tell them it is a shrinking machine
2.5 year olds could pass this task - no longer stands for a small room, it is the same room but shrunken (no dual rep)
161
What earlier concept we discussed in class corresponds to the results of dual representation studies shown here?
anatomically detailed dolls
under 5 yrs - fail to understand the connection between themselves and the dolls
162
cross-cultural research - shows that experience does matter in development of dual representation. What are two examples of this?
Canadian infants match line drawings to real objects (rural India and Peru do not)
American toddlers generalize the names of objects in photos to the objects themselves (rural Tanzania do not)
163
What is a scale error? Why does it occur?
attempts by young children to perform an action on a miniature object that is impossible due to the large discrepancy in the relative sizes of the child and object
*failing to understand (tiny car, chair) are symbols for their real-life counterparts - dual representation
164
___ mo infants don’t understand 2D images
____ - ____ don’t understand 3D scale models
9
19mo- 2 ½ yo
165
Early understanding of number:
- newborns understand _______________
- ______months old (age) have an understanding of basic arithmetic and probability
- 5 counting principles children must master (counting does not equal _________________)
-numerical equality
-5-6 months old
-understanding
166
Early understanding of physics:
- ___-month-olds understand solidity and continuity
- between ______ months developing understanding of gravity
- ____-year-olds make gravity “errors”
- 3 month olds
- 3-12 months
- 2-3 year olds
167
2 early understandings (concepts) of causality:
- transference of energy
- make inferences from indirect evidence
