Ch 7: Early cognitive development

Sensation

Sensory development - Detection of stimuli by the sensory receptors and transmission of this information to the brain.

Perception

Sensory development - Process by which we categorize and interpret sensory input.

Learning

Cognitive development - The process by which our behaviours change as a result of experience.

Empiricism

Nature versus nurture - The view that infants must learn to interpret sensations and that experience is essential for constructing an understanding of the world. William James argued that newborns experience a “blooming, buzzing confusion” of sensory input.

Nativism

Nature versus nurture - The view that many basic perceptual abilities are innate. Nativist philosophers argued that humans are born with certain perceptual understandings, such as spatial relations.

Nature and nurture in perceptual development

Sensory development - Perceptual abilities reflect both biological maturation and experience. Newborns perceive some order in their surroundings, but their perceptual world is initially limited.

Enrichment theory

Perceptual development - Theory specifying that we must add to sensory stimulation by drawing on stored knowledge in order to perceive a meaningful world. Associated with Piaget, this theory proposes that cognition enriches ambiguous or fragmented sensory input to help us interpret it.

Differentiation theory

Perceptual development - Theory specifying that perception involves detecting distinctive features or cues that are contained in the sensory stimulation we receive. Associated with Eleanor Gibson, this theory proposes that the information needed to interpret experiences is already present in sensory input.

Distinctive features

Perceptual development - Characteristics of a stimulus that remain constant; dimensions on which two or more objects differ and can be discriminated (sometimes called invariances or invariant features).

Preference method

Infant research methods - Method used to gain information about infants’ perceptual abilities by presenting two (or more) stimuli and observing which stimulus the infant prefers. Researchers infer a preference when an infant looks longer at one stimulus than another.

Robert Fantz’s visual preference research

Infant perception - Fantz showed that newborns can discriminate visual patterns and prefer patterned stimuli, such as faces and concentric circles, over unpatterned disks. His findings suggest that the ability to detect and discriminate patterns is innate.

Limitation of the preference method

Infant research methods - If infants show no preference between stimuli, researchers cannot determine whether they fail to discriminate the stimuli or simply find them equally interesting.

Habituation

Infant research methods - Decrease in response to a stimulus that has become familiar through repetition. Responses that may decline include eye or head movements and changes in respiration or heart rate.

Habituation method

Infant research methods - A method for assessing infant sensory and perceptual abilities by repeatedly presenting a stimulus until the infant’s response declines, then introducing a new stimulus to determine whether the infant detects a difference.

Dishabituation

Infant research methods - An increase in responsiveness that occurs when stimulation changes. If an infant responds more strongly to a new stimulus after habituating to an old one, this suggests the infant can discriminate between them.

Familiarization–novelty procedure

Infant research methods - Another name for the habituation method, which uses infants’ declining responses to familiar stimuli and renewed attention to novel stimuli to assess recognition and discrimination.

Habituation versus preference

Infant research methods - Habituation is a decrease in responding as a stimulus becomes familiar. Preference refers to greater attention to one stimulus than another. Infants may initially prefer a partially familiar stimulus, but after becoming thoroughly familiar with it, they may look longer at a novel stimulus.

High-amplitude sucking method

Infant research methods - A method of assessing infants’ perceptual capabilities that capitalizes on the ability of infants to make interesting events last by varying the rate at which they suck on a special pacifier. It is suitable for infants from birth to about 4 months old.

Using high-amplitude sucking to test discrimination

Infant research methods - Researchers establish an infant’s baseline sucking rate and then link faster or harder sucking to sensory stimulation. If a new stimulus produces increased high-amplitude sucking after a previous stimulus no longer does, this suggests the infant can discriminate between the stimuli.

Using high-amplitude sucking to test preferences

Infant research methods - Researchers can link high-amplitude sucking to one stimulus and low-amplitude or no sucking to another. The infant’s sucking behaviour indicates which stimulus is preferred, such as a mother’s voice versus a stranger’s voice.

Evoked potential

Infant research methods - A change in patterning of the brain waves that indicates that an individual detects (senses) a stimulus.

Evoked potentials method

Infant research methods - A method of studying infant sensory and perceptual abilities by presenting stimuli and recording changes in brain waves using electrodes placed on the scalp. Different patterns of electrical activity can indicate whether an infant detects or discriminates stimuli.

Brain regions recorded in evoked potentials research

Infant brain research - Responses to visual stimuli are recorded from the back of the head, above the occipital lobe, while responses to sounds are recorded from the side of the head, above the temporal lobe.

Magnetoencephalography (MEG)

Infant brain research - A neuroimaging technique that records the magnetic fields generated by the brain’s electrical activity. It can indicate when and where brain activity occurs as infants detect stimuli, such as speech and nonspeech sounds.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)

Infant brain research - A neuroimaging technique that measures oxygen-rich blood flow to specific brain areas to identify where brain activity occurs in response to a stimulus. It measures activity over seconds rather than milliseconds.

Resting-state fMRI

Infant brain research - A modified form of fMRI used to study how brain areas are functionally organized when infants are not actively performing a task.

Evoked potentials versus MEG

Infant brain research - Evoked potentials record electrical changes in brain-wave patterns following stimulus detection. MEG records magnetic fields generated by brain electrical activity and provides information about both when and where activity occurs.

MEG versus fMRI

Infant brain research - MEG tracks the timing and location of brain activity with very high temporal precision, while fMRI measures changes in oxygen-rich blood flow to identify where activity occurs but has lower temporal precision.

Why study early sensation, perception, and learning

Cognitive development - These processes are fundamental to human functioning because people’s interpretations of and reactions to sensory input shape how they acquire knowledge about the world.

Hearing

Auditory localization

Hearing - The ability to tell where a sound is coming from. Newborns turn toward sounds, may stop doing so around 1 month, and reliably do it again by 3–5 months.

U-shaped auditory localization

Hearing development - A pattern where babies first turn toward sounds, temporarily stop responding reliably, and then begin turning toward sounds again as their brains mature.

Mother’s voice recognition

Hearing before and after birth - Newborns prefer their mother’s voice over another woman’s voice, partly because they heard it before birth.

Prenatal learning

Learning before birth - Learning that happens before a baby is born. Fetuses can learn familiar sounds, such as their mother’s voice.

Prosodic cues

Speech and hearing - Features of speech, such as pitch, rhythm, and stress, that help babies recognize familiar voices and speech patterns.

Speech preference

Hearing development - Newborns prefer speech-like sounds over nonspeech sounds, including sounds similar to the speech they heard before birth.

Name recognition

Speech development - By about 4½ months, babies can turn toward their own name more reliably than toward other names, even before they understand what their name means.

Sweet taste preference

Taste - Newborns prefer sweet liquids and may suck longer and faster to get them. Sweet tastes can also reduce crying and produce smiling.

Taste discrimination

Taste - The ability to tell different tastes apart, such as sweet, salty, sour, and bitter. Newborns show different facial expressions in response to different tastes.

Smell (odour) recognition

Smell - Newborns can detect different smells and turn away from unpleasant ones. Breastfed babies can recognize their mother by her smell within the first 1–2 weeks.

Olfactory signature

Smell - A person’s unique, characteristic smell that can help babies recognize familiar people.

Touch sensitivity

Touch - Newborns respond to touch, and gentle stroking or massage can calm them, reduce stress, and support development. Babies also use touch to explore objects.

Temperature sensitivity

Temperature - Newborns respond to warmth, cold, and changes in temperature. They may become more active when a room gets colder.

Pain sensitivity

Pain - Newborns feel pain and show distress, such as crying, when hurt. Skin-to-skin contact with their mother and warmth can reduce signs of pain.

Vision

Newborn senses - Vision is the least developed sense at birth. Newborns can detect light, movement, and some patterns, but fine details are blurry.

Face preference

Vision - Newborns tend to look at and follow faces more than some other patterns, and they prefer their mother’s face over a stranger’s face.

Colour vision

Vision - Newborns can see some colours but have trouble telling certain colours apart. By 2–3 months, they can distinguish basic colours more clearly.

Visual acuity

Vision - A person’s ability to see small objects and fine detail. Newborns have poor visual acuity, but it improves rapidly during the first year.

Accommodation

Vision - The eye’s ability to change the shape of its lens to bring an object into focus. Newborns have difficulty focusing clearly on objects.

Visual contrast

Vision - The amount of difference between light and dark in a visual image. Newborns see patterns more easily when the light-dark contrast is strong.

Experience-independent development

Vision development - Development that happens without needing specific experiences or learning from the environment.

Experience-dependent development

Vision development - Development that is shaped by an infant’s experiences, such as looking at and exploring the world.

Pattern perception

Infant vision - An infant’s ability to notice and tell the difference between visual patterns. Newborns prefer patterns with strong light-dark contrast and moderate complexity.

High-contrast patterns

Infant vision - Patterns with clear differences between light and dark that are easier for young infants to see.

Form perception

Infant vision - An infant’s ability to recognize shapes and understand that separate visible parts belong to one whole object. This ability improves during the first year.

Visual scanning

Infant vision - How infants move their eyes to look at different parts of an object or picture. Younger infants scan less thoroughly than older infants.

Kinetic cues

Infant perception - Movement cues that help infants recognize objects and shapes. For example, infants may recognize a partly hidden rod as one whole rod when its visible parts move together.

Subjective contour

Infant vision - A shape or edge that infants can see even though its outline is not actually drawn. By 3–4 months, infants can perceive some hidden shapes, such as a square.

Point-light display

Infant vision - A set of moving lights that shows how something moves. By about 9 months, infants can recognize a human figure from the movement of these lights.

Face perception

Infant vision - An infant’s ability to notice facial features and recognize faces. This ability develops with brain maturation and visual experience.

Stereopsis

Infant depth perception - Using both eyes together to see depth. Infants generally begin developing this ability around 3–5 months.

Pictorial cues

Infant depth perception - Clues in pictures that help infants judge which objects look closer or farther away. Infants become more sensitive to these cues between about 5 and 7 months.

Linear perspective

Infant depth perception - When lines appear to come closer together as they get farther away, helping infants perceive distance.

Texture gradient

Infant depth perception - When nearby surfaces show more detail than distant surfaces, helping infants judge distance.

Relative size cue

Infant depth perception - A clue that helps infants judge distance because objects that look smaller may be farther away.

Interposition

Infant depth perception - When one object blocks part of another, helping infants perceive the blocking object as closer.

Shading cue

Infant depth perception - Light and shadow that help infants perceive an object as having depth rather than being flat.

Visual looming

Infant depth perception - When an approaching object appears to grow larger as it gets closer to an infant. Infants may blink or move their bodies as if anticipating a collision.

Size constancy

Infant depth perception - The tendency to perceive an object as the same size from different distances, even when its image on the retina changes size. This ability is present at birth and improves throughout childhood.

Visual cliff

Infant depth perception - An elevated glass platform that creates the illusion of a drop, used to test whether infants can detect depth. Most infants around 6½ months and older cross the shallow side but avoid the deep side.

Depth perception

Infant vision - An infant’s ability to tell how far away objects are and recognize drops or differences in height. Different depth cues develop at different ages.

Motor experience and depth perception

Infant development - Creeping and crawling help infants learn how depth relates to their own movement and which surfaces they can cross safely. Experienced crawlers are more likely to avoid dangerous drop-offs.

Affordances

Infant motor development - The actions an infant can safely do in their surroundings. Through crawling experience, infants learn which slopes and drop-offs they can manage.

Spatial landmark

Infant spatial perception - A familiar feature, such as a coloured container, that helps an infant remember where an object is located.

Optical flow

Infant spatial perception - The way objects appear to move around an infant when the infant moves. This helps infants learn about movement and space.

Intermodal perception

Infant perception - The ability to use one sense to recognize something already familiar through another sense. For example, an infant may recognize an object by touch after seeing it.

Sensory integration

Infant perception - When an infant combines information from different senses, such as seeing an object and expecting to feel it when reaching for it.

Visual-tactile integration

Infant perception - Infants expect objects they can see and reach for to be felt by touch. When young infants reach for a visible object but feel nothing, they may become upset.

Auditory-visual integration

Infant perception - When infants connect what they see with what they hear. For example, a baby expects their mother’s voice to come from the direction of her mouth when she is talking.

Mother’s face–voice association

Infant perception - Newborns need to see and hear their mother to show a preference for her face over strangers’ faces. Infants can learn to match unfamiliar faces with voices by about 3½ months.

Oral-to-visual perception

Infant perception - The ability to recognize something by sight after previously exploring it with the mouth. For example, 1-month-old infants who suck on an object may later look longer at a different object.

Development of intermodal perception

Infant perception - Infants’ ability to connect information from different senses improves during the first year. It begins weakly and becomes stronger as they gain experience and their senses develop.

Touch-to-vision perception

Infant perception - The ability to connect what an infant feels by touch with what they see. This ability becomes more noticeable around 4–6 months, when infants can grasp objects better.

Auditory-visual matching

Infant perception - The ability to match what an infant hears with what they see. It emerges around 4 months; for example, infants can match a sound of a train moving away with a video of a train moving away.

Face-speech matching

Infant perception - The ability to connect a person’s face movements with speech sounds. This matching ability has been observed at birth.

Object-sound matching

Infant perception - The ability to connect objects with the sounds they make. Four- and eight-month-old infants can notice familiar objects and sounds presented in a different order, but 8-month-olds are better at noticing changes to just the sounds or just the objects.

Multisensory cues

Infant perception - Information from more than one sense at the same time. For example, 12-month-old infants cross a visual cliff more quickly when they receive both visual and auditory encouragement from their mothers.

Intersensory redundancy hypothesis

Infant perception - The idea that receiving information through multiple senses at the same time helps infants develop and distinguish their senses. For example, watching and hearing a kitten helps an infant learn about both its appearance and its sounds.

Amodal perception

Infant perception - An early state in which an infant experiences information from different senses as a whole rather than clearly separating each sense.

Intermodal development

Infant perception - The process in which infants gradually learn to separate information from different senses and then connect those senses to understand the world.

Perceptual learning

Infant and child development - Changes in the ability to get information from the senses as a result of experience. For example, infants gradually learn to notice the features that make familiar objects different from one another.

Distinctive features

Infant and child perception - The features that help distinguish one object from another. As children grow, they learn to notice features such as an animal’s shape, size, or long ears.

Gibson’s differentiation theory

Infant and child perception - The theory that children learn to perceive more accurately by actively exploring their environment and noticing the features that make objects and events different.

Perceptual differentiation

Infant and child perception - The process of learning to notice increasingly specific differences between objects and events. For example, a child learns to tell apart animals that look similar.

Perceptual enrichment

Infant and child perception - The idea that children use what they already know to help interpret sensory information, rather than relying only on noticing differences.

Cultural influences on perception

Infant and child development - Experiences within a culture shape which sights and sounds people notice and how they interpret them. Infants can initially distinguish speech sounds that adults may later struggle to hear if those sounds are not important in their language.

Phonemic discrimination

Infant perception - The ability to distinguish speech sounds. Infants can initially tell apart sounds such as “r” and “l,” but experience with their language can make them less sensitive to differences that their language does not use.

Musical perception

Infant perception - The ability to notice musical patterns and sounds. Four-month-old infants may prefer musical beats common in their culture, while 6-month-old infants can detect notes that sound out of tune in both familiar and unfamiliar musical scales.

Perceptual narrowing

Infant and child development - The process in which children become more sensitive to sights and sounds that matter in their environment and less sensitive to distinctions they rarely experience. For example, infants can distinguish more speech sounds than adults who have become specialized in their native language.

Cultural learning

Infant and child development - Learning from the experiences and traditions of one’s culture, which influences how people interpret sensory information. For example, cultural experience can shape how people perceive speech sounds, music, and foods.

Learning

Infant development - A relatively permanent change in behaviour or the ability to behave that happens because of experience or practice. For example, an infant learns that crying can bring a caregiver to them.