Newborn imitation and cognitive
development: Charting the
prevalence, time course and social-cognitive correlates of neonatal
imitation
Imitation is something that we all do naturally and often. It is thought that infants imitate from birth, but that idea is controversial because the crucial studies have not been done. Our ongoing study aims to settle this issue by testing more thoroughly than ever before, how reliably human infants imitate other people in the first several months of life. We are also investigating the extent to which imitation exhibited by newborns is related to later-developing social skills like smiling, gesturing and using language.
Thinking about the future: The nature and development of mental time travel
Time travel may never be physically possible. We do however regularly travel in time in our minds. While psychologists have long studied memory, little is known about our ability to consider the future. We are systematically investigating how children acquire the capacity to imagine and plan for the future.
Elements of body perception in the first two years of life
In this series of studies, we are evaluating what features of the human body are relevant to young infants. Do infants notice when bodies are scrambled or presented upside down? Do they prefer male or female body shapes? Do they prefer bodies with infant proportions, or adult bodies? We know that from birth, infants are attracted to faces; are they also attracted to other important body parts like hands?
Imitation is something that we all do naturally and often. It is thought that infants imitate from birth, but that idea is controversial because the crucial studies have not been done. Our ongoing study aims to settle this issue by testing more thoroughly than ever before, how reliably human infants imitate other people in the first several months of life. We are also investigating the extent to which imitation exhibited by newborns is related to later-developing social skills like smiling, gesturing and using language.
Thinking about the future: The nature and development of mental time travel
Time travel may never be physically possible. We do however regularly travel in time in our minds. While psychologists have long studied memory, little is known about our ability to consider the future. We are systematically investigating how children acquire the capacity to imagine and plan for the future.
Elements of body perception in the first two years of life
In this series of studies, we are evaluating what features of the human body are relevant to young infants. Do infants notice when bodies are scrambled or presented upside down? Do they prefer male or female body shapes? Do they prefer bodies with infant proportions, or adult bodies? We know that from birth, infants are attracted to faces; are they also attracted to other important body parts like hands?
Learning
about counting in infancy
The vast majority of human cultures possess a routine for counting things. Although counting generally is not mastered until children are around 4 years old, our experiments indicate that the principles of counting are first learned in infancy. So far, we have found that 18-month-olds prefer to watch videos that depict correct counting, compared to videos depicting incorrect counting. Our ongoing studies are investigating what types of counting errors infants are sensitive to, and whether infants’ early preferences for correct counting are linked to counting skill and other mathematical abilities in the preschool period and beyond.
Learning from others via imitation
When doing what others do, children learn about how the world works. At the same time, copying someone else brings children's experiences in line with others and provides them with a way of getting information about what others feel, and why others do what they do. Imitation is thus seen to be a critical mechanism of learning and a central element of children's cognitive and social development. Two studies are currently being run that investigate this ability in 4 year olds, one is designed to help us better understand how children learn directly while the other is designed to assess how children learn in third party situations where they see one person show something to another.
The vast majority of human cultures possess a routine for counting things. Although counting generally is not mastered until children are around 4 years old, our experiments indicate that the principles of counting are first learned in infancy. So far, we have found that 18-month-olds prefer to watch videos that depict correct counting, compared to videos depicting incorrect counting. Our ongoing studies are investigating what types of counting errors infants are sensitive to, and whether infants’ early preferences for correct counting are linked to counting skill and other mathematical abilities in the preschool period and beyond.
Learning from others via imitation
When doing what others do, children learn about how the world works. At the same time, copying someone else brings children's experiences in line with others and provides them with a way of getting information about what others feel, and why others do what they do. Imitation is thus seen to be a critical mechanism of learning and a central element of children's cognitive and social development. Two studies are currently being run that investigate this ability in 4 year olds, one is designed to help us better understand how children learn directly while the other is designed to assess how children learn in third party situations where they see one person show something to another.
© 2010
Early Cognitive
Development Centre. School of Psychology. The University of Queensland.
Website design by Katie McFadden.
Website design by Katie McFadden.