Lecture 4: Cognitive Development
Core knowledge:
Perceptual and Conceptual
Capacitates common to
everyone
● When we talk about core knowledge and
developmental psychology, we talk about some
specific capacities that humans have to learn
particular kinds of material with very minimal input
● We do not understand the whole concept completely
but we quickly learn the foundations of concepts
future learning will be built on
○ This suggests that we are not necessarily a
complete blank slate for these things
○ We may not be born with knowledge but we
have be born with the ability to be prepared to
learn particular kinds of knowledge
● There are different kinds of core knowledge systems
that the developmental psychologists are interested
in:
○ Numerical relationships
■ Understanding automatically that
there is either more or less of
something just by taking a quick look
at it
■ NOT counting but a sense of more or
less in an approximate system
○ Object properties
■ Objects have a rule that they follow
which is bound in the laws of physics
■ Ex. If I take a mug and hide it behind
me, the baby will know that it still
exists and gravity will work on it
(without understanding the concept of
gravity itself)
■ Ex. If I take a mug and drop it, the
baby knows that it will drop
■ Many animals know about these
object properties too
○ Agents and goal directed actions
● How to know if something is core knowledge or not
(Core knowledge system)
○ Core knowledge is something that will
develop really early in infancy
■ Core knowledge seems to develop
even before babies have had a chance
to completely construct this
knowledge if they are doing it from
the scratch
■ So earlier that you might not have
expected given input as the idea
 ○ Core knowledge has to be something that is
shared across cultures and sometimes even
species (primates close to humans)

Core knowledge for ● Children’s automatic number system

numerical relationships ○ This is not a counting system or not that a
baby will understand that the number 6 will
come after the number but it is a general
sense of how much appreciate there is
○ It is the sense that you can compare the ratio
of things without actually counting them
■ Ex. If you look at a crowd of people,
you will be able to tell that a crowd of
200 people is bigger than a crowd of
100 people without individually
counting them
■ Ex. if you see 2 piles of food with
different amounts, you will
automatically know that one pile has
more food than the other pile without
weighing them individually
○ This does not require formal schooling it does
not need to know or understand maths but this
is more of an approximate number system
● Even infants have some sense of core knowledge
system about this numerical relationship
● There is a sense that sometimes if the ratio is big
enough they know when there is more of something
than there is less of something
○ Most studies on this have used visual
differences where the baby looks at
something of less versus at something that is
of more
○ Even newborn babies can tell the difference
at 3:1 ratio
■ Ex. they can tell apart from 1 item to 3
items, and they can tell apart from 2
items to 6 items, they can tell apart
from 3 items to 9 items, and so on
○ The ratio is what appears to be the driver of
the discrimination ability
● Study Izard et al., 2009
○ The study is not only about examining
approximate number system in a visual space,
but it crosses modalities (sensory systems like
vision vs. auditory)
○ The study tests to train infants in one
modality (auditory) and testing them in
another modality (visual)
○ In the study, they familiarize newborn babies
to two minute bursts of auditory stimuli and
they would assign the infants to either be
exposed to many events in a burst or few
events in a burst
■ (ex. If a baby is hearing 12 auditory
events in a burst, where they might
hear
“tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu” 12
times then a little break and then hear
“ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra” 12
times until the 2 minutes are over)
○ The babies assigned to the 4 events condition,
then they would just hear 4 auditory events in
a burst, where they might hear “tu-tu-tu-tu” 4
times then a little break and then hear
“ra-ra-ra-ra” 4 times until the 2 minutes are
over
○ Teaching during familiarization is happening:
teaching the babies 12 things or 4 things
○ On the test, all the babies would see displays ,
one at a time, either of 4 visual items or 12
visual items and their looking times to thee
displays were measured
○ We would expect the babies who have
familiarized to 12 things to behave differently
than those who have familiarized in 4 things
if they are perceiving something about the
number of events in one modality space and
mapping it onto the other one
○ They found that if the babies were
familiarized to 12 things then they looked
longer at the visual displays of test that also
showed 12 things
■ This would be the congruent visual
display; the visual display that
matches the number of events that
happened in the auditory presentation
○ They found that if the babies were
familiarized to 4 things then they looked
longer at the visual displays of test that also
showed 4 things
■ This would be the congruent visual
display; the visual display that
matches the number of events that
happened in the auditory presentation
○ They look longer at the congruent visual
display on the test in comparison to the
incongruent visual display
 ○
■ The black bars show congruent visual
display which means that if they heard
12 things, they are also looking at 12
things (same for 4 things)
■ The ratio of these events for show that
the ratio of 1:3 works whereas, 1:2
ratio is harder for the infants to
discriminate

Core Knowledge for Object ● This area of core knowledge research is well studied
Properties: Unsupported and we know more information about this
objects fall ● For studies related to this topic, the use violations of
expectations paradigm
○ Violations of expectations paradigm is if
babies are expecting to see a particular series
of events and after watching a show/videos,
they expect to see Display A but instead they
see Display C which is surprising and
therefore, they will look longer at the
surprising display
■ So if you violate the babies’
expectations, they will need to look at
it longer to figure out what is
happening
○ This is used a lot in cognitive tests because
this also demonstrates the idea of building or
constructing knowledge through experience
● This study looks at whether babies expect objects to
fall when you drop them; do they have the concept of
gravity - should objects fall if they are just pushed off
a surface
○
○ The age underneath each of these displays
show the age of the babies who has passed
past this stage in the experiment - 3 month
old baby will know that a violation has
occurred
○ In the initial concept (contact/no contact)
display: the baby will be habituated to the
clown-like face being pushed along a barrier
■ At this stage, they start to understand
the concept of contact and no contact
■ Once they are habituated to that event,
then they are shown that the face is
going over the barrier and floating
■ If the baby is expecting it to fall, then
they will find this surprising and they
will look longer at it
■ Before 3 months of age, the babies do
not have the expectation to see the
face fall; however, at 3 months of age,
they will find this event surprising
where the object slides off the surface
and instead of falling, the object
hovers without any support
underneath it
○ In the variable (type of contact) display: the
baby will be habituated to the object being
pushed along a barrier
■ At this stage, they start to understand
the concept of different types of
contact
■ Once they are habituated to that event,
then they are shown that the object is
sliding/slipping down the barrier
instead of floating
■ If the baby is expecting it to fall, then
they will find this surprising and they
will look longer at it
■ Before 5 months of age, the babies do
not have the expectation to see the
object fall; however, at 5 months of
age, they will find this event
surprising where the object slides off
the surface and instead of falling, the
 object slides along the side of the
surface without any other support
○ In the variable (amount of contact) display:
the baby will be habituated to the object being
pushed along a barrier
■ At this stage, they start to understand
the concept of different amounts of
contact
■ Once they are habituated to that event,
then they are shown that the object is
touching the surface by a very small
amount but the object is not falling
even after having very little amount of
contact to support the object being
held up
■ If the baby is expecting it to fall, then
they will find this surprising and they
will look longer at it
■ Before 6.5 months of age, the babies
do not have the expectation to see the
object fall; however, at 6.5 months of
age, they will find this event
surprising where the object slides off
the surface and instead of falling, the
object is being held up by a very small
amount of contact which otherwise
should allow the object to fall
○ In the variable (shape of the box) display: the
baby will be habituated to the object being
pushed along a barrier
■ At this stage, they start to understand
the concept of the support that
different types of boxes may need
■ Once they are habituated to that event,
then they are shown that an irregular
shaped object is being put on top of
the surface and the surface is still
being able to take up the
irregular/bigger object
● There is too much on one side
of the object which is not
distributed properly and babies
would expect it to fall/topple
over
■ If the baby is expecting it to fall, then
they will find this surprising and they
will look longer at it
■ Before 12.5 months of age, the babies
do not have the expectation to see the

Does “surprise” promote ● The researchers are interested to look into is that
learning and exploration?
● The study was done on children who were 11 months
object fall; however, at 12.5 months of
age, they will find this event
surprising where the object when
being put on top of the surface instead
of falling, the object stays put on top
of the surface without any additional
support
what is the surprise that they lead you to…???
of age
○ This meant that the babies found it surprising
when they were expecting the car too fall but
instead the car kept floating in midair
○ The research does not look at if the babies
find this to be surprising, however, the
research looks at what the babies do after they
find it surprising
■ They measured how often do these
babies pick up the objects and drop
them or bang the toy
○ Support condition: The first one is a support
event because the box is supporting the object
and when it no longer is supporting the object
■ The babies in this condition are seen
to be dropping the toys after
experiencing the violation of
expectation paradigm because they are
trying to test out their knowledge and
trying to confirm whether the
knowledge violation held up
● Ex. they are testing to see if
the object can actually be held
up and can it be held up by
themselves (confirming their
knowledge)
○ Solidarity condition: A car/object driving
down a ramp and there is a barrier in the way
which should make the object stop where you
would expect the object to hit the barrier and
stop rolling/moving but they see the object
passing through the wall
■ The babies in this condition are seen
to be banging the toys after
experiencing the violation of
expectation paradigm because they are
trying to test out their knowledge and
trying to confirm whether the

Concept Check 1 Babies watch a magic show where the magician pushes a toy
bunny off a box, but instead of falling, the toy bunny floats
in midair. What is the youngest age group that would infants
find this scene surprising?
Core Knowledge for Object
Properties: Objects
Continue to Exist
knowledge violation held up
● Ex. they are testing to see if
the object can actually be
passed through and can it be
passed through by themselves
(confirming their knowledge)
● This can happen even at 3
months of age
A. 3 months and up
B. 5 months and up
C. 7.5 months and up
D. 12.5 months and up
● Object permanence is this idea that an object
continues to exist even when it is hidden
○ Piaget’s take on object permanence: his big
test for object permanence was search
behaviour. If babies tried to search for an
object that was hidden in front of them, then
Piaget believed that this was an indication of
object permanence being ready to go and
without the search, Piaget did not think that
they had object permanence or at least they
could not demonstrate it
● Children only search for hidden objects at 8 months
○ Piaget thought that this would happen during
the 8 months because at 8 months babies are
able to coordinate their action patterns to do a
means to an end (ex. Lift the blanket they
want the toy)
● Search continues to improve throughout infancy
○ However, this does not stop at 8 months. At 8
months, they will lift up a blanket and search
for an object but throughout time, the search
or their skills will get refined
○ At 8 months they can pass the search test, but
they will fail the A-not B-error test
■ A-not B-error task is if you hide an
object in the same spot (Location A) a
few times over, they will find it every
time but if you know hide the same
object in a different spot (Location B),
they will go back to look for the
object in the first spot (Location A)
● Children fail at the A-not
 B-error task until 12 months of
age
● What are some issues with using “search” as a
measure of object permanence?
○ Motivation: they may know that it continues
to exist, but they do not want to continue it
○ Maybe they understand the object exists, but
they do not have the motor capacity yet to
perform the searching
● Possible versus impossible events

○ This study looks into the habituation method

○ Studies similar to this always have a basic
beginning of the scene and then they test out
how they attend to either a surprising or a
unsurprising event
○ In a classic series of tests of object
permanence, Renée Baillargeon and her
colleagues first habituated young infants to
the sight of a screen rotating through 180
degrees (watching this fan-like object move
backwards away from you).
■ Their looking time is measured by the
yellow line in graph and they look at it
 for about 20 seconds
○ Then a box was placed in the path of the path
and there are 2 conditions.
○ In the possible event condition, the screen
rotated up, occluding the box, and stopped
when it reached the top of the box.
○ In the impossible event condition, the screen
rotated up, occluding the box, but then
continued on through 180 degrees, appearing
to pass through the space where the box was.
○ Even though the impossible event looked
similar to the first (habituation) event, the
infants looked longer at the impossible event,
showing they mentally represented the
presence of the invisible box.
■ This shows that these babies have
object permanence
○ The possible even is boring in terms of
cognitive perspective because it is doing what
you would expect it to do
○ Babies pass this test even at 4.5 months of
age (which is well before the 8 month of age
that Piaget discovered)
● Classic A- not B-error

Questions to Ponder ● If babies seem to expect that hidden objects continue

to exist well before they demonstrate search
behaviour, why do they still fail the A not B error
task?

Investigating the social ● The role of the experiment here is the experimenter’s
environment of the A-not-B looks to either Location A or Location B or to
search task (Dunn & nowhere is going to change the baby’s performance
Bremner, 2020) and is it also going to change how likely the babies
are to pass the task and is it also going to change?
● They did the standard A-not-B error task with the
babies and they hid the object in location A and the
baby searches for it in and then they hide it in
location B and look at whether or not the baby finds
it or not
● They do this a few times and so the number of errors
is the number of times they are looking in Location A
even though the item now is in Location B but the
thing that they manipulated is that where the
experimenter is looking.
○ So on those b test trials: The experimenter
would look either at location location B,
which is where the item is and it is congruent
with its hidden location, or the experimenter
would look at location A where the item is
 NOT present and it is incongruent
○ Or they would look neutrally (not look at
Location A or B, but they would look at the
baby’s eyes) where they are not looking at
either the locations
● The graph shows the number of eros that they make
in their searches
○ In trial A: they are not making much mistake
meaning they might be good at passing A
trials
■ The babies are finding it the first time
in location A and there also is no
effect of where the epxeerimenter is
looking
● Congruent means that they are
looking wher the object is
hidden
○ So in A trials they are
looking at Location A
○ In B trials, they are
looking at Location B
● This might mean that social
information probably is not
that useful when it is an easy
task (item hidden in location
A), the babies are not paying
attention to where the
researcher is looking, and they
are finding the item quickly
■ In trial B:
● The item has been hidden in
location B
● Here, compared to the A trial,
there are a lot more errors
● We also see a difference across
the 3 error bars which indicate
an effect of social
manipulation: So if the
experimenter is looking at the
congruent location (Location
B in this case), then the babies
are using this information and
passing the task better (fewer
errors) than if the experimenter
is looking at their their face or
at location A (the incongruent
location)
○ The either measure that they looked at is how
much they look at the experiemerter after
 they find the object (accurate search) or when
they do not find the object (searching at
Location B)
■ If the baby foundd the item in location
b, the ydo not even look at the
experimenter either they gave the
baby the right, wrong, or no
information
■ They oly stare at the experimenter
after the experimetner gave them the
wrong confirmation (incongruent)
■ The baby excerpt the adult to give
them the correct and reliable
information and maybe it is surprising
and unexpected when the person gave
them the inaccurate information
● In the A-not-B error task, social information is
relevant to where the experimenter is looking or not
looking is actually how the baby performs
● But also babies seem to have an expectation that
those social looks are going to be meaningful
● But if those looks lead to the wrong information, they
are surprised
○ Therefore, social information is important to
think about talk about in this cognitive effect

Categorization improves ● Categorization allows us to improve our cognitive

cognitive efficiency efficiency
○ Be able to organize information, how things
are connected/related, you start to understand
the relationship between things and it makes
you better at processing incoming
information because you have system that can
place it in
○ Categorization is related to memory and
knowledge being structured
○ Our cognitive processes can efficiently
categorize which allows us to really organize
our information into basic categories that are
then nested into more larger categories
○ Categories really help us reduce variability in
our environment to manageable smaller
chunks
○ Categorization decreases cognitive load and
simplifies processed and even if we can
discriminate many more things, we sort of
categorize them together and that allows us to
be able to communicate with one another

Measuring Categorization ● Familiarization: Habituation to different examples

using the
Familiarization-Novelty
Preference Procedure
When and What do infants
categorize?
Can newborns
“categorize”? Maybe some
broad perceptual categories
Perceptual vs. Conceptual
Categories
within a category, or category exemplars
● Novel category preference test: If infants look longer
at the animal from the novel category (e.g., the cat),
categorization can be inferred
● By at least 7 months of age:
○ Emotional expressions (happy vs. angry)
○ But not earlier
● By at least 3 months of age:
○ Animals (dogs vs. horses vs. cats)
○ Furniture (bed vs. couch)
○ Shapes (circles vs. triangles vs. squares vs.
crosses)
● Newborns generally cannot perform very well on
categorization tests (not until 3 months of age)
● However, they MAY BE able to categorize only
when there was a comparison of their performance
on open versus closed shapes but anything more
complex, they cannot do
● Newborns can categorize or tell the difference
between X’s and O’s
● Perceptual categories: Formed based on detection of
common perceived features (i.e., visual features)
actress items
● Conceptual categories: Categories formed from
richer, higher-level information than merely
perceptual similarities
○ Maybe be able to categorize near their 1st
birthday
● In a study, they tested 14 month old babies and they
were able to categorize things you can find in a
kitchen compared things you find in a bathroom
○ The things in the kitchens would be more
visually similar to one another than cross
boundary, but they still had some sense by 14
months of age that some of the things belong
in the kitchen and some belong in the
bathroom (accordingly)
○ There might be something conceptual
happening
● Another study with babies 7 and 12 months of age
where the experimenter would be playing with some
toys with the babies and the demonstrator would
have a toy animal and make the toy animal drink
from a cup and they would see how much the babies
would imitate giving a drink to the toy and they
 would make animals drink from a cup
○ However, they would not give a drink to a toy
vehicle which means that they are
understanding that there may be something
conceptual about who would receive a drink
from the cup and it would not be the vehicle
■ Generalization of imitating a model
● Conceptual boundary only generalize within
conceptual boundaries
● In a study, they had 6 to 9 month old babies who
were habituated to static pictures of a dogs or
vehicles (a freeze frame on moving picture of either
dogs or vehicles)
○ On tests, these babies were shown point light
displays (imagine a stick figure from a
motion capture walking and you can just see
the dots, and you can still tell if it is a dog or
a car with very minimal visual information to
confirm) of dogs or vehicles
○ If the babies are habituated to dogs and then
they are shown the point light displays and
they look differently at the vehicle versus the
dog, it shows that there may be something
more than just the visual properties that they
are learning and categorizing
○ If the babies are habituated to vehicles and
then they are shown the point light displays
and they look differently at the dog versus the
vehicle, it shows that there may be something
more than just the visual properties that they
are learning and categorizing
○ 6 month olds have no problem categorizing
dogs if they just see pictures of dogs and they
did not seem to recognize the category levels
when you switched from a static display to a
point light display or vice versa
○ The 9 month old babies somewhat seemed to
get something conceptual but only if they are
habituated to the point light displays and then
tested on the static images
■ So if they were given the higher level
complicated point light display, they
probably would extract meaning from
it to understand that that is a dog
■ Therefore, nothing much really
happens before the 1st birthday
● Language development is happening around 12
months which may be causing a shift from perceptual
to conceptual around their first birthday
 ○ So may be learning languages is shaping and
expanding categorization from a perceptual
level

Concept Check 2 You are running a study to see if babies have a category for
books. During habituation, you show them pairs of photos of
various books. Once they have habituated, you show them a
photo of a new book and a smartphone. They look longer at
the smartphone. What can you conclude?
A. Infants prefer electronic devices over books
B. Infants do not have a category for “books”
C. Infants might categorize books, but follow-up
conditions are required
D. Infants have formed a conceptual category for
phones

Summary ● New, flexible skills and belief systems build on core

knowledge foundations
● This is reflected in early expectations about members
and objects. These become refined with experience
and maturation
● Information must be organized perceptually and
conceptually to improve cognitive efficiency
● Perceptual categorization appears early in life, and
likely lays the foundation for later conceptual
categorization