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Search tasks • Failure to search could imply lack of object permanence or: • Loss of interest • Limited working memory • Inability to coordinate search movements
Competence vs. performance • A child might have object permanence (competence) but still not be able to search (performance) • Competence = underlying ability to do something • Performance = whether someone actually does it • Piaget’s search task conflates (mixes up) competence and performance, leading him to underestimate infants’ abilities. This is a frequent criticism of all of Piaget’s methods for investigating children’s thinking.
Can you think of a more valid way of testing for object permanence? • Many researchers have adopted the child’s looking as a measure of object permanence
Bower et al (1971) • 5 month-old infants’ visual tracking was recorded as they watched a moving object disappear behind a screen.
Bower et al (1971) • What would Piaget predict to happen once the object has disappeared behind the screen?
Bower & Wishart (1972) • 4 month-old infants shown a toy. • Lights were turned off so the room was in complete darkness. Infants were observed with an infra-red camera. • What would Piaget predict about the child’s behaviour once the room was darkened?
Why might we argue that Bower’s tests of object permanence are more valid than Piaget’s?
Baillargeon (1985; 1987) • Used the habituation paradigm: • Infants will spend more time looking at new things. • They are shown a stimulus until they look away (habituation) • They are then shown other stimuli based on the first. • Differences in looking time show that the infant can tell the difference between the stimuli
Baillargeon (1985; 1987) • 4 month-old infants habituated and then shown ‘possible’ and ‘impossible’ events
Baillargeon (1985; 1987) • 4 month-old infants habituated and then shown ‘possible’ and ‘impossible’ events
Baillargeon (1985; 1987) • Baillargeon found that infants would look for longer at impossible events. • What conclusions can be drawn from this finding? • What do Bower’s and Baillargeon’s results imply about Piaget’s view of object permanence?
Homework • Read the article about Baillargeon’s studies and answer the accompanying questions.