Young infants perceive an object's trajectory as continuous across occlusion provided the temporal or spatial gap in perception is small. In 3 experiments involving 72 participants the authors investigated the effects of different forms of auditory information on 4-month-olds' perception of trajectory continuity. Provision of dynamic auditory…

We investigated whether great apes, like human infants, monkeys and dogs, are subject to a strong gravity bias when tested with the tubes task, and--in case of mastery--what the source of competence on the tubes task is. We presented 22 apes with three versions of the tubes task, in which an object is dropped down a tube connected to one of three…

Twenty-four infants were tested monthly for gaze and point following between 9 and 15 months of age and mother-infant free play sessions were also conducted at 9, 12, and 15 months (Carpenter, Nagell, & Tomasello, 1998). Using this data set, this study explored relations between maternal talk about mental states during mothers' free play with…

Two experiments explored the existence and the development of relations between action representations and object representations. A priming paradigm was used in which participants viewed an action pantomime followed by the picture of a tool, the tool being either associated or unassociated with the preceding action. Overall, we observed that the…

Purpose of the study was to determine whether a name for a toy affects an infant's attentional preference for a toy and whether this process is related to the infant's concept of subject permanence. (Authors)

Prior to considering the ability of infants to think, this discussion attempts to dispel prevalent myths about babies' thought processes. The fact that infants do not intentionally manipulate their parents; are not identical; are not simply hedonistic seekers of bodily pleasures; and are not passive, disorganized beings needing training into…

Examined perception of object unity in partial occlusion in 72 infants. Recorded how long subjects looked at a display of complete and incomplete rods. In test and control conditions, infants looked longer at broken rods than at complete rods, suggesting that infants' cognitive, visual, or attentional skills may be insufficient to support…