Fourteen- through 18-month-old infants differentially imitate intentional and accidental actions

Carpenter, Malinda; Akhtar, Nameera; Tomasello, Michael

doi:10.1016/s0163-6383(98)90009-1

Cited by 628 publications

(484 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…Older children and adults plan their search in steps. One possible reason younger children neglect visual information is that they focus more on the goal of an action than on the procedures (Gergely, Nasady et al 1995;Meltzoff 1995;Carpenter, Akhtar et al 1998;Woodward 1998;Csibra, Gergely et al 1999;Woodward and Somerville 2000;Woodward, Sommerville et al 2001;Carpenter, Call et al 2002;Woodward and Guajardo 2002;Csibra, Biro et al 2003;Sommerville and Woodward 2005). Still, by the age of six years, when children are asked to describe the path from one place to another, they focus on the goal and not on the route there (Plumert, Pick et al 1994).…”

Section: Action Planningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fitting objects into holes: On the development of spatial cognition skills.

Örnkloo¹,

Hofsten²

2007

Developmental Psychology

121

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The authors examined 14-to 26-month-old infants' understanding of the spatial relationships between objects and apertures in an object manipulation task. The task was to insert objects with various cross-sections (circular, square, rectangular, ellipsoid, and triangular) into fitting apertures. A successful solution required the infant to mentally rotate the object to be fit into the aperture and use that information to plan the action. The object was presented standing up in half of the trials; in the other half, it was lying down. The results showed that infants solved the problem consistently from age 22 months and that a successful solution was associated with appropriate preadjustments before the hand arrived with the block to the aperture. No sex differences were found.

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Section: Action Planningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fitting objects into holes: On the development of spatial cognition skills.

Örnkloo¹,

Hofsten²

2007

Developmental Psychology

121

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“…Sensitivity to the goal structure of action also plays a powerful role in mediating learning across a variety of domains. Goal understanding guides early word learning (Baldwin & Moses, 2001;Woodward, in press), governs toddlers' social learning and problem-solving attempts (Carpenter, Akhtar, & Tomasello, 1998;Carpenter, Call, & Tomasello, 2002;Meltzoff, 1995) and informs children's understanding of cultural instruments and artifacts (Bloom & Markson, 1998;Defeyter & German, 2003).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Action experience alters 3-month-old infants' perception of others' actions

2005

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An intervention facilitated 3-month-old infants' apprehension of objects either prior to (reach first), or after (watch first) viewing another person grasp similar objects in a visual habituation procedure. Action experience facilitated action perception: reach-first infants focused on the relation between the actor and her goal, but watch-first infants did not. Infants' sensitivity to the actor's goal was correlated with their engagement in object-directed contact with the toys. These findings indicate that infants can rapidly form goal-based action representations and suggest a developmental link between infants' goal directed actions and their ability to detect goals in the actions of others.

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“…In contrast, presuming a mentalistic interpretive stance in infants, others argue that infants attribute different goals and intentions to the demonstrator depending on their physical constraints (Bekkering et al 2000;Carpenter et al 2002). In line with this later approach, recent studies provided evidence for the selective, inferential nature of the infants' imitation of goal-directed actions (Schwier et al 2006;Gergely et al 2002;Carpenter et al 1998;Carpenter et al 2002). Gergely et al ( 2002), for example, found that when an unusual, less efficient action (switching a light box on with the head) is demonstrated in a manner that is cognitively opaque to the infant (there is no obvious reason why the demonstrator did not use her hand, the familiar and clearly more efficient alternative means action), 14-monthold infants are willing to re-enact the observed head action.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why do dogs (Canis familiaris) select the empty container in an observational learning task?

Kupán

Miklósi

Gergely³

et al. 2010

Anim Cogn

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Many argue that dogs show unique susceptibility to human communicative signals that make them suitable for being engaged in complex co-operation with humans. It has also been revealed that socially provided information is particularly effective in influencing the behaviour of dogs even when the human's action demonstration conveys inefficient or mistaken solution of task. It is unclear, however, how the communicative nature of the demonstration context and the presence of the human demonstrator affect the dogs' objectchoice behaviour in observational learning situations. In order to unfold the effects of these factors, 76 adult pet dogs could observe a communicative or a non-communicative demonstration in which the human retrieved a tennis ball from under an opaque container while manipulating another distant and obviously empty (transparent) one. Subjects were then allowed to choose either in the presence of the demonstrator or after she left the room. Results showed a significant main effect of the demonstration context (presence or absence of the human's communicative signals), and we also found some evidence for the responsemodifying effect of the presence of the human demonstrator during the dogs' choice. That is, dogs predominantly chose the baited container, but if the demonstration context was communicative and the human was present during the dogs' choice, subjects' tendency to select the baited container has been reduced. In agreement with the studies showing sensitivity to human's communicative signals in dogs, these findings point to a special form of social influence in observational learning situations when it comes to learning about causally opaque and less efficient (compared to what comes natural to the dog) action demonstrations.

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Fourteen- through 18-month-old infants differentially imitate intentional and accidental actions

Cited by 628 publications

References 16 publications

Fitting objects into holes: On the development of spatial cognition skills.

Fitting objects into holes: On the development of spatial cognition skills.

Action experience alters 3-month-old infants' perception of others' actions

Why do dogs (Canis familiaris) select the empty container in an observational learning task?

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