Lecture Notes on Infant Sensation, Perception, and Learning in PSYC 307 - Prof. Rachel Hul, Study notes of Developmental Psychology

Download Lecture Notes on Infant Sensation, Perception, and Learning in PSYC 307 - Prof. Rachel Hul and more Study notes Developmental Psychology in PDF only on Docsity! PSYC 307 3.21.13 Chapter 5 Lecture Notes True / False  Infants are born with a taste for the foods common to their culture.  Infants benefit most when their toys are changed often. Sensation & Perception  Sensation: when information interacts with sensory receptors—the eyes, ears, tongue, nostrils, and skin (physical process)  Perception: when the brain interprets sensory information to make it meaningful (mental process) o The physical energy collected in the retina (sensation) is interpreted as a particular color, pattern, or shape (perception) o Sensation is a constructive process How Do Infants Learn about their World?  Experiences form the context for learning  Learning happens when o a stimulus is repeated, and o Neural pathways are formed to represent the experience  Gradually, infants and children learn to differentiate sensations as favorable or deterrent o Objects have affordances - opportunities for interaction Dynamic Systems Theory  Nature and nurture together drive motor skills that meet environmental demands  Children develop gross motor skills gradually through maturation o But motor development is not a passive genetic unfolding o Perceptions help fine-tune infants’ motor and cognitive skills (and beyond) o Motivate infants to adapt movements to solve a new motor goal  Grasp  Kenya- people run everywhere they go. It is part of their culture  Sensory & Perceptual Capacities The Orienting Response  Infant turns head toward a sight or sound  Shows infant can see or hear 1 PSYC 307 3.21.13 Visual Tracking  Eye movements follow a moving object  Evaluates infant’s early visual ability o Newborns don’t track smoothly until Visual Scanning  Pattern detecting ability o Infants scan for patterns, look for limits, improve over time o Attracted to more complex patterns Visual Acuity  Young infants prefer to look at patterns of high visual contrast because they have poor contrast sensitivity  Cones differ from adults’  Acuity tests and fatty acids  Newborns see color poorly, can detect brightness and movement, focus best at 8-12” o ~20/240 o Nerves, muscles, cones, and lens of the eye are still developing  Visual discrimination (acuity) develops rapidly o Prefer mom’s face within days o By 2-3 months can track movement, have good color vision; match voices to faces; discriminate faces from their own vs. other ethnic groups o By 4-5 months- 20/60 acuity; hand-eye coordination; binocular vision, and depth perception Measuring Sensory & Perceptual Capacities Visual Preference aka Preferential-looking-  Examines infants’ ability to discriminate between stimuli seen at the same time o Show infant 2 stimuli at once o 2-day-old infants prefer to look at patterns—a face, a bull’s-eye  Whichever they spend more time looking at, they like more  Prefer more complicated image  Evolutionary psychology looks at infant preferences that are the same universally o Number one phobia in the world is snakes. Even infants are more drawn to looking at snake compared to other stimuli they would normally find interesting. o Not just what do they prefer, but what do they perceive period? Looking Time  Length of time infant is visually fixated on a stimulus  Repeated presentation of the same stimulus measures infant’s ability to distinguish between old and new stimuli o Baby begins to ignore the same stimulus seen repeatedly o Introduce new stimulus—what happens? 2