Infants' expectations about the spatial and physical properties of a hidden object

Abstract

The purpose of this project was to investigate which spatial and physical object properties 9-month-old infants would use to trace an object in time and space. The particular object characteristics of interest were size, location and features. A two-location task was used, with looking time as the dependent measure. Infants observed a small toy troll, which was subsequently occluded. When the two flaps were removed, the infants observed either a standard or a change event. During the standard event no change occurred (the small troll was revealed at the same location). During a change event, some sort of physical or spatial change took place; the object might have changed its size (the large troll was revealed at the same location), its location (the small troll was revealed at the other location), its features (the small bear was revealed at the same location), or some combination of these attributes. Infants only observed one type of change event, depending on which of the seven conditions they were assigned to. The findings from this study can be interpreted in terms of two default assumptions: the Same Location/Same Object Rule and the Different Location/Different Object Rule. Nine-month olds use size cues to inform them about object identity in both situations; additionally, they use featural cues to inform them in the second case.