Elsevier

Cognition

Volume 98, Issue 2, December 2005, Pages B45-B55
Cognition

Brief article
Can infants attribute to an agent a disposition to perform a particular action?

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2005.04.004Get rights and content

Abstract

The present research investigated whether 13.5-month-old infants would attribute to an actor a disposition to perform a recurring action, and would then use this information to predict which of two new objects—one that could be used to perform the action and one that could not—the actor would grasp next. During familiarization, the infants watched an actor slide various objects forward and backward on an apparatus floor. During test, the infants saw two new identical objects placed side by side: one stood inside a short frame that left little room for sliding; the other stood inside a longer frame that left ample room for sliding. The infants who saw the actor grasp the object inside the short frame looked reliably longer than those who saw the actor grasp the object inside the long frame. This and control results from a lifting condition provide evidence that by 13.5 months, infants can attribute to an actor a disposition to perform a particular action.

Section snippets

The present research

The infants first received three familiarization trials in which they saw an actor grasp an object on an apparatus floor and repeatedly slide it forward and backward (see Fig. 1). Different objects—a toy fish, a box, and a baby shoe—were used in the three trials. Next, the infants received a static pretest display trial in which they saw two identical toy trucks resting side by side on the apparatus floor (see Fig. 2). The truck on the right (from the infants' perspective) stood inside a short

Participants

Participants were 30 healthy term infants, 15 male and 15 female (range=13 months, 1 day to 14 months, 14 days, M=13 months, 18 days). Another 14 infants were eliminated because they were inattentive (4), distracted (4), or active (2), looked the maximum amount of time allowed on 3 or more of the 5 trials they received (3), or looked over 3 SD above the mean of their condition in the test trial (1). Fifteen infants were randomly assigned to each action condition; within each condition, 8

Results

Fig. 4 shows the infants' mean looking times during the familiarization, display, and test trials. The infants' looking times during the three familiarization trials were averaged and analyzed by means of a 2×2 analysis of variance with action condition (sliding or lifting) and event condition (short- or long-frame) as between-subjects factors. No effect was significant, all Fs(1, 26)<1.89, P>.15, suggesting that the infants in the four experimental groups tended to look equally during the

Discussion

When the actor repeatedly slid the various objects before her during familiarization, the infants took her actions to reveal a particular disposition, namely, an inclination to slide objects. During test, the infants (1) expected the actor's disposition to again guide her actions; (2) realized that the truck inside the long frame was “slideable” but that the truck inside the short frame was not; and hence (3) were surprised when the actor reached for the truck inside the short frame.

When the

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by grants from NICHD to Renée Baillargeon (HD 21104) and Cynthia Fisher (HD 44458). We thank Gergely Csibra and György Gergely for helpful comments; the staff of the University of Illinois Infant Cognition Laboratory for their help with the data collection; and the parents and infants who kindly participated in the research.

References (22)

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