1
Q
What is natural familiarity?
A
- stimuli infants experience often in their lives
2
Q
What is lab induced familiarity?
A
- familiarize infant to a new stimulus by first exposing them to it for a brief amount of time
3
Q
What determines if an infant will choose familiarity or novelty in the lab?
A
- length of exposure time to an initial stimulus determines whether an infant will show a familiarity or novelty preference
- short exposure = familiarity preference
- long/repeated exposure = novelty preference
4
Q
What is intermodal perception?
A
- the coordinated perception of a singular object or event through 2 or more sensory systems
- often vision and at least one other sensory modality
- intermodal perception is present very early on
5
Q
Do infants have intermodal perception for vision and touch at birth?
A
- yes, ability to combine visual information with touch is present from birth
- newborns looked longer at pacifier they sucked on
6
Q
Do infants have intermodal perception for vision and sound at birth?
A
- no
- 4 months
- infants can integrate visual and auditory information
- important for language development because children need to understand that speech sounds are linked with a moving mouth
- 4 month olds looked longer at person playing peekaboo than drums
7
Q
What are reflexes?
A
- innate, involuntary actions that occur in response to a particular stimulation
- reflexes are adaptive
- function of some is unclear
8
Q
What are some reflexes?
A
- grasping
- rooting (turn head in direction of stimulus)
- sucking
- stepping
- tonic neck reflex (when head turned one way, their arm on that side extends and the arm and knee on the other side bend
9
Q
When do reflexes disappear?
A
- 2 months
- some don’t like coughing, sneezing, blinking, withdrawing from pain
- absent reflexes or reflexes that persist for too long can mean the infant has neurological problems
10
Q
What are motor milestones?
A
- major motor developmental tasks of a period
- happen in sequence, rarely out of order
- huge individual variation in the ages these milestones are achieved
11
Q
What are the motor milestones in infancy?
A
- 0-1 month: prone, lift head
- 2-4 months: prone, chest up, uses arms for support
- 2-5 months: rolls over
- 3-6 months: supports some weight with legs
- 4-8 months: sits without support
- 5-10 months: stands with support
- 6-10 months: pulls self to stand
- 7-13 months: walks using furniture for support
- 9-14 months: stands alone easily
- 11-15 months: walks alone easily
12
Q
What about crawling?
A
- babies begin crawling at 7-8 months
- different crawling styles
- it is not a motor milestone
- many healthy babies never crawl and skip right to walking
13
Q
Why do some babies skip crawling?
A
- upper body or core weakness (lack the strength)
- hypersensitive to the textures of the floor
- insufficient opportunity
14
Q
Cultural differences in motor milestones
A
- average ages of milestones are based on WEIRD samples, but most infants in the world are not
- only 15% of the world’s population is WEIRD
- cultural practices lead to individual differences in when motor milestones are achieved
15
Q
Why are there cross cultural differences in how long 5 month olds can sit independently?
A
- related to where infants’ are placed to sit
- little postural support (ground, adult furniture) vs lots of postural support (child furniture, being held)
- earlier independent sitting in countries where infants spent more time in places with less postural support
- later independent sitting in countries where infants spent more time in places with lots of postural support
16
Q
What else culturally impacts motor milestones?
A
- encouragement
- diapers
17
Q
How does encouragement impact motor skills?
A
- motor milestones are affected by how many opportunities infants have to practice and how much motor development is actively encouraged
- in some countries, infants are discouraged from crawling because of safety or hygiene so crawl later or never, other countries practice motor exercises and their infants are more advanced in motor skill development
18
Q
How do diapers affect walking?
A
- infants show more mature walking when naked vs. when wearing a diaper even when used to wearing a diaper
- diapers may contribute to cross cultural differences in walking
- more mature walking: narrow stance, small steps
- less mature walking: wider stance, larger steps
19
Q
What are the implications of cultural differences?
A
- cultural practices in one domain can have unintended consequences in another domain
- context plays an important role in motor development
- differences in the course of motor development reflect the contexts in which infants are developing
20
Q
What are the early theories of mechanisms behind motor development?
A
- motor development governed by cortical maturation
21
Q
What are the current theories of mechanisms behind motor development?
A
motor development governed by complex interplay between numerous factors; all these factors contribute to individual differences in motor development:
- neural development
- increases in physical strength
- physical abilities, like posture control and balance
- perceptual skills
- change in body proportions and weight
- motivation
22
Q
Why does the stepping reflex disappear (at 2 months, and then reappear 7-12 months when learning to walk)?
A
- infants gain weight faster than they build leg muscles and thus have insufficient strength to lift heavier legs
- young infants who still showed stepping reflex stopped stepping when weights were attached to their ankles
- infants who no longer show stepping reflex resumed stepping when placed in a tank of water
- disappearance of stepping reflex is due to weight change and not just cortical maturation
23
Q
What is the role of motivation?
A
- infants are highly, intrinsically motivated to explore and learn
- persistence despite failing
- continue to practice new skills even though they possess skills that are more efficient that could accomplish the same goal
- look delighted when practicing new skills
- individual differences in motivation predict when motor milestones are achieved
- low motivation infants: movements occur infrequently, prefer activities that require little energy, require lots of stimulation to change position
- high motivation infants: move often, prefer high energy activity, change position often, do not need clear stimulation to move
- highly motivated infants achieved all motor milestones earlier than less motivated infants
24
Q
Why does motor development matter?
A
- enables active learning and expands an infant’s world
- allows children to learn by trial and error rather than just passively observing
- facilitates development of skills in other domains, especially vision and social behaviour
25
How does motor development help with vision?
- crawlers and walkers see the world differently (crawlers see floor, walkers see people)
- reaching enables object exploration which has consequences for visual development
- impact depth perception
26
How does reaching impact visual development?
- at 7 months, can sit and reach
- infants can become familiar with the properties of objects, including 3D objects
- infants more advanced in sitting and reaching, are more likely to have 3D object completion
- motor skills development in sitting and reaching influence development of 3D object perception
27
How does motor development impact depth perception?
- beginner crawlers confidently went down shallow slope but also attempted slopes that were too steep
- experienced crawlers avoided slopes
- same thing occurs with walking
- suggests that infants have to learn through experience how to integrate perceptual information with each new motor skill developed
28
What are scale errors?
- attempt to perform an action on a miniature object that is impossible due to the huge difference in size between the child and object
- present until around 2 years
- due to failure to integrate visual information with action planning
29
What is proactive gaze shifting?
- adults proactively shift their gaze to the goal of an action when observing somebody performing that action
- indicates that they understand the person's intention
30
When do infants develop pro active gaze shifting?
- by 12 months
- shows that infants ability to predict others' actions relies on them being able to perform these same actions, need experience
