© 2009the mcgraw-hill companies, inc. all rights reserved. slide 1 john w. santrock cognitive...

© 2009The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.

Slide 1

John W. Santrock

Cognitive Development in Infancy

6


Slide 2

Cognitive Development In Infancy

• What Is Piaget’s Theory of Infant Development?

• How Do Infants Learn, Remember, and Conceptualize?

• How Are Individual Differences in Infant Intelligence Assessed and Do These Assessments Predict Intelligence?

• What Are Some Early Environmental Influences on Cognitive Development?

• What Is the Nature of Language and How Does It Develop in Infancy?


Slide 3

Images of Children

• The stories of Laurent, Lucienne, and Jacqueline

– Piaget’s children are the “models” for his theory

– Meticulous observations on cognitive development

What Is Piaget’s Theory of Infant Development?


Slide 4

Cognitive Processes

• Adaptation: involves adjusting to new environmental demands

– We build mental structures to help us adapt

– Children actively construct their own cognitive worlds



Slide 5

Cognitive Processes

• Schemes: mental representations or actions that organize knowledge

•

– Assimilation: incorporating new information into existing schemes

– Accommodation: adjusting schemes to fit new information and experiences



Slide 6

Cognitive Processes

• Organization – grouping isolated behaviors and thoughts into higher-order system– Equilibrium – mechanism for shifting from

one level of thought to another

– Disequilibrium – result of cognitive conflict

– Cognition: qualitatively different in each stage of development



Slide 7

Sensorimotor Stage

• First of Piaget’s stages

– Lasts from birth to about 2 years of age

– Infants construct understanding of the world by coordinating sensory experiences with physical, motoric actions; use of symbols



Slide 8

Substage Age Description

Simple reflexes Birth - 1 month

Coordinates sensations, actions

First habits, primary circular reactions

1 - 4 months

Coordination of sensations, habits, and primary circular reactions; body still main focus

Secondary circular reactions

4 - 8 months

More object-oriented, repeats interesting/ pleasurable acts

Coordination of secondary circular reactions

8 - 12 months

Coordination of schemes/touch/ vision, eye-hand coordination, intentional acts

Tertiary circular reactions, novelty and curiosity

12 - 18 months

Intrigued by properties of and things done with objects, experiments with new behaviors

Internalization of schemes

18 - 24 months

Ability to use primitive symbols, form lasting mental images

Sensorimotor Substages

Figure 6.1


Slide 9

Understanding Physical Reality

• Object Permanence– Understanding that objects and events

continue to exist even when they cannot be seen, heard, or touched

– One of infant’s most important achievements, assessed by violation of expectations

– Understanding of causality



Slide 10

Fig. 6.2

(a) (b)

Object Permanence


Slide 11The Infant’s Understanding of Causality


Slide 12

Evaluating Piaget’s Sensorimotor Stage

• New way of looking at infants

• Piaget’s views need modification; his explanations of cause are debated

– Object permanence occurs earlier– Distinguishing objects by 3 to 4 months– A-not-B error: infant selects familiar hiding

place (A) rather than new hiding place (B)



Slide 13

Conditioning

• Consequences of behavior produce

– Rovee-Collier experiment on memory

– Classical conditioning: pairing of new stimulus to conditioned response

– Operant conditioning: consequences of behavior affect probability of that behavior reoccurring

How Do Infants Learn, Remember, and Conceptualize?


Slide 14

Attention

• Focusing of mental resources on select information; helps cognitive processing

– Habituation: decreased responsiveness to stimulus after repeated presentations

– Dishabituation: habituated response recovered after a change in stimulation

– “Short lookers” versus “long lookers”



Slide 15

Attention

• Joint attention – individuals focus on same object or event

– Requires

• Ability to track another’s behavior

• One person directing another’s attention

• Reciprocal interaction

– Important to caregiver-infant interactions



Slide 16

Memory

• Retention of information over time– Attention is important for encoding– Implicit memory: recall is automatic– Explicit memory: recall is conscious effort– Infantile or childhood amnesia

• Most remember little from first 3 years• Immaturity of prefrontal lobe



Slide 17

Imitation

• Meltzoff – Infant can imitate facial expression within a few days after birth; others disagree

• Deferred imitation: imitate actions seen earlier; use of unusual gestures (extending arm, pointing index finger, etc.)– Piaget: begins about 18 months of age

– Meltzoff: begins much earlier than 18 months

– Mirror neurons play role in infant imitation



Slide 18

Concept Formation and Categorization

• Categories – grouping objects, events, characteristics by common features

• Concepts – ideas on what categories represent– Conceptual categories: perceptual

variability found in 7- to 9-month-old infants– Object-examination test



Slide 19

Infant Intelligence

• Infant testing movement grew• Gesell: distinguish abnormal babies for

adoption agencies– Developmental quotient (DQ): overall

developmental score, combines domains• Motor • Language• Adaptive• Personal-social

How Are Individual Differences in Infant Intelligence Assessed and Do They Predict IQ?


Slide 20

Bayley Scales of Infant Development

• Widely used in assessment of infant development; has three components:

– Mental scale; auditory and visual attention

– Motor scale

– Infant behavior profile

• Assesses infant, predicts later behavior



Slide 21

Infant Intelligence

• Fagan Test of Infant Intelligence– Increased use; focus on infant ability to

process information• Encoding attributes of objects• Detecting object similarities and differences• Forming and retrieving mental representations

– Similar infant performances across cultures



Slide 22

Predicting Intelligence

• Older children – IQ tests focus on verbal ability

• Infants – IQ tests focus on perceptual-motor development and social behavior– Gesell and Bayley scales: poor predictors– Fagan: good correlation with later IQ tests– Habituation and dishabituation linked to IQ



Slide 23

Nutrition

• Affects physical development

• Malnutrition limits cognitive development

• Early nutritional supplements, proteins and calories, have positive long-term effects

What Are Some Early Environmental Influences on Cognitive Development?


Slide 24

Poverty

• Positive effects sought by manipulating children’s early environments

– Emphasis on prevention, not remediation

– Early intervention programs vary

– Many low-income parents cannot provide intellectually stimulating environment



Slide 25

50

0

10

20

30

60

40

Ch

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gra

de

s (p

erc

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Treatment Group

InterventionControl

Fig. 6.9

Early Intervention

and Retention in School


Slide 26

Poverty

• Best intervention programs are– Long lasting– Time-intensive– Providing direct educational benefits

• Often in educational context• Does not rely solely on parental training

– Comprehensive and multidimensional



Slide 27

Defining Language

• Language: form of communication (verbal, written, gestures) based on system of symbols; highly organized

• Infinite generativity: ability to produce endless number of meaningful sentences using finite set of words and rules

What Is The Nature of Language and How Does It Develop in Infancy?


Slide 28

Language’s Rule Systems

• Five systems of rules– Phonology

• Sound system of language• Basis and sequences for sets of words• Phoneme: smallest unit of sound

– Morphology• Units of meaning in word formation• Morpheme: smallest unit of meaning



Slide 29

Language’s Rule Systems

• Syntax– Ways words combine to form acceptable

phrases and sentences

• Semantics– Meanings of words and sentences

• Pragmatics– Appropriate use of language in context



Slide 30

How Language Develops

• Babbling and gestures•

– Crying: present at birth, signals distress

– Cooing: begins about 1 to 2 months

– Babbling: occurs in middle of first year, strings of consonant-vowel combinations

– Gestures: begins about 8 to 12 months; about same for hearing and deaf children



Slide 31

Recognizing Language Sounds

• Birth to 6 months– “Citizens of the Word”: recognize most

sound changes in any language

• After 6 months, learn own language– Gradually lose ability to recognize sound

changes in other languages

• 8 to 9 months: detect word boundaries



Slide 32

First Words

• First words at 10 to 15 months

– First words name important people, familiar animals and objects, body parts, greetings

– Infants understand about 50 words at 13 months (receptive vocabulary) but unable to say them until about 18 months (spoken vocabulary)



Slide 33

Fig. 6.12

Variation in Language Milestones

9

15

21

24

27

12

18

First words Vocabulary spurt

Age

(m

onth

s)

Language Milestone


Slide 34

Language Growth

• Vocabulary spurt: 18 months to 2 years– 50 words at 18 mos, 200 words at 2 years– Overextension: applying words too broadly– Underextension: applying word too narrowly

• Two-Word Utterances– Telegraphic speech: use of short and

precise words without grammatical markers



Slide 35

Biological and Environmental Influences

• Biological

– Evolution of CNS and vocal apparatus

– Human language about 100,000 years old

– Children’s language acquisition similar all over the world (biological basis)



Slide 36

Biological and Environmental Influences

• Brain’s Role in Language– Aphasia—Brain damage that involves a

loss of ability to use words– Broca’s area—Brain’s left frontal lobe that

directs the muscle movements involved in speech production

– Wernicke’s area—Brain’s left hemisphere; involved in language comprehension



Slide 37

Broca’s Area and Wernicke’s Area


Slide 38

Language Acquisition Device (LAD)

• Chomsky– Humans biologically prewired for language

– Children born with LAD; biological ability to detect features and rules of language

– Theoretical; not physical part of brain

– Supporters cite uniformity of language milestones across languages and cultures



Slide 39

Environmental Influences

• Behaviorists view cannot explain– Creation of novel sentences

– Learning of a native language syntax without reinforcements

• Extensive research on environment– Environment influences language skills

– Importance of social context: ‘Wild Boy of Aveyron’ and ‘Genie’



Slide 40


• Tomasello – interaction view– Language learned in specific contexts

– In early development: children use social skills to acquire language

– Child’s vocabulary linked to family’s socioeconomic status

• Type of talk parents direct to child

• Elaborated or restrictive vocabularies



Slide 41

Environmental Influences on Language

• Child-directed speech– Spoken in higher pitch than normal with

simple words and sentences– Holds attention, maintains communication



Slide 42


• Other strategies used naturally:

– Recasting: rephrasing what child says

– Expanding: sophisticated restating of what the child says

– Labeling: assigning, identifying objects by name



Slide 43

How Parents Can Facilitate Infants’ Language Development

• Baron’s Growing Up With Language


• Infants– Be active

conversational partner– Talk as if infant

understands what is being said

– Use a comfortable language style

• Toddlers– Continue being active

conversational partner– Remember to listen– Use comfortable and

appropriate styles– Be flexible with child– Avoid stereotypes


Slide 44

Welfare

18 22 26 30 34 3810

Age of children (months)

800

400

Pa

ren

t utte

ran

ces

to c

hild

pe

r h

o ur

600

200

014

Professional

Fig. 6.16 (a)

Language Input in

Professional and Welfare Families and

Young Children’s

Vocabulary Development


Slide 45

Fig. 6.16 (b)

18 22 26 30 34 3810

Age of children (months)

800

400

Ch

ildre

n’s

cum

ula

tive

v o

c abu

lary

wo

rds

600

200

1200

1000

014

Welfare

Professional

Language Input in

Professional and Welfare Families and

Young Children’s

Vocabulary Development


Slide 46

Interactionist View of Language Development

• Biology and sociocultural experiences contribute to language development

• Parents and teachers construct LASS— language acquisition support system

• Children acquire native language without explicit teaching



Slide 47

The End

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