Question 1

What is the earliest age that habituation to a repeated stimulus has been demonstrated?

Accepted Answer

Habituation to a repeated stimulus has been demonstrated prenatally, indicating that even before birth, humans are capable of this basic form of learning.

Question 2

Which statement best characterizes the research findings regarding the growth of perceptual abilities?

Accepted Answer

The answer of Which statement best characterizes the research findings...

Question 3

In this example, what is the low battery power?

Accepted Answer

An unconditioned stimulus is something that naturally and automatically triggers a response without any learning needed. In this context, low battery power naturally triggers a response (such as seeking a charger) without the need for learning, making it an unconditioned stimulus.

Question 4

Research indicates that young children (16 to 24 months of age) learn through observation.According to these research findings, what behaviours are older children most likely to imitate?

Accepted Answer

Older children are most likely to imitate routines and regulations as they observe and learn from the environment around them, understanding and adopting behaviors that are structured and have a pattern. This is because such behaviors help them make sense of the world and how they are expected to act within it.

Question 5

Of the various sensory modalities, which is the least mature at birth?

Accepted Answer

Vision is the least mature sensory modality at birth. Newborns have limited visual acuity and are not able to see long distances or in great detail. Their vision develops significantly in the first few months of life.

Question 6

What is the term for the process whereby the removal of a stimulus after a response increases the likelihood of the response occurring again?

Accepted Answer

Negative reinforcement involves the removal of an unpleasant stimulus as a consequence of a behavior, which in turn increases the likelihood of the behavior being repeated in the future.

Question 7

Imagine that an infant is shown a blue-coloured card repeatedly.If the colour of the card is now changed to green, and the infant displays increased interest, what can researchers infer?

Accepted Answer

The increased interest in the green card after being repeatedly shown a blue card suggests that the infant can perceive the difference between the two colors, indicating color perception ability.

Question 8

Which type of learning is characterized by a new response emerging after seeing others perform that same response?

Accepted Answer

Observational learning, also known as social learning or modeling, is characterized by acquiring new behaviors through observing and imitating others.

Question 9

A proud grandmother announces to her friends: "Yesterday my 7-month-old granddaughter clearly remembered a toy that she played with when she visited me three weeks ago." Based on the results of research on infant habituation and memory, is the grandmother's claim possible?

Accepted Answer

Research on infant habituation and memory has shown that infants can remember familiar events, especially when given cues, even at a young age. This means the grandmother's claim is quite possible.

Question 10

In addition to her demonstration that 2- and 3-month-olds can learn to kick vigorously when it results in movement of a mobile, what else did Rovee-Collier demonstrate with respect the development of infant memory?

Accepted Answer

Rovee-Collier's research demonstrated that infants can remember the action-outcome relationship for a few days without any prompts and that their memory of the learned behavior can be reactivated with a prompt, extending at least up to 18 days.

Question 11

Bandura maintained that observational learning has two advantages over other forms of learning.One is that a new response may be added through imitation of a model.What is a second advantage?

Accepted Answer

Direct reinforcement is not needed to learn the behavior through observational learning, according to Bandura. This means individuals can learn new behaviors by observing others without personally experiencing any rewards or punishments.

Question 12

In newborns, which sense is the least like an adult's?

Accepted Answer

Newborns have relatively poor vision at birth, which significantly differs from adult-like vision. Their visual acuity is limited, and they see best at close distances, with a preference for high-contrast patterns. Vision develops and improves over the first few months of life as the eye and the visual processing areas of the brain mature.

Question 13

Keith uses a specialized video camera to record the eye movements of infants aged 3 to 6 months old as they are shown a variety of stimuli.After determining how long the infants gaze at each stimulus, he reports that the infants prefer bright red circles to other colours or shapes.Based on this description, which research method is Keith using?

Accepted Answer

Keith is using the preference method, which involves showing infants two different stimuli to see which one they prefer, indicated by longer gaze duration. This method is used to infer infants' perceptual abilities and preferences.

Question 14

Of the following stimuli, which would be most likely to attract a neonate's visual attention?

Accepted Answer

Human faces are particularly attractive to neonates due to their predisposition to attend to and recognize face-like patterns, which is crucial for social development.

Question 15

What is thought to account for the failure of neonates to perceive form?

Accepted Answer

The answer of What is thought to account for the...

Question 16

Like the development of form perception, an infants' perception of depth, distance, and size constancy appears in response to specific stimuli.What is the common property of these stimuli?

Accepted Answer

Infants' perception of depth, distance, and size constancy often develops in response to stimuli that are in motion, as movement provides important cues for perceiving spatial relationships.

Question 17

If you were to compare the number of presentations of a stimulus before habituation occurred for a 1-month-old and a 12-month-old, what would you expect to find?

Accepted Answer

The younger child would typically require many more presentations of a stimulus before habituation occurs compared to an older infant. This is because as children age, their cognitive and neural mechanisms become more efficient, allowing them to habituate to repeated stimuli more quickly.

Question 18

Lawrence knows that a quarter is precisely the same size regardless of whether he looks at it from far away or up close.In order to understand this concept, what aspect of visual perception has Lawrence acquired?

Accepted Answer

Lawrence has acquired size constancy, which is the ability to perceive the size of an object as constant despite changes in the distance from which it is viewed. This means he understands that the quarter remains the same size whether he looks at it from a near or far distance.

Question 19

Clyde tells his friends that even though he travels a lot and is only home about once every two weeks, his 6-month-old son still knows him.Is Clyde right?

Accepted Answer

Infants as young as 6 months can indeed remember faces they have been exposed to, even if they do not see them again for a period of up to two weeks. This ability is part of their developing recognition memory and attachment processes.

Question 20

According to the research of Weigelt et al.(2015), children diagnosed with which of the following showed delayed development in facial recognition, as compared to typically developing children of the same age?

Accepted Answer

Research by Weigelt et al. (2015) indicates that children with autism exhibit delayed development in facial recognition compared to typically developing children.

Quiz 7: Early Cognitive Foundations: Sensation, Perception, and Learning