1Infant ears
Sense all noises but ignore most of them
2Babies listen closely to sounds that teach, particularly the human voice
Instead of attending to every noise
3does not become; it helps the baby understand
Perception ___ cognition unless __
4Particular speech sounds
Babies need to attend to these that are meaningful in their community and every linguistic nuance must be percieved
5Universalists
Babies are these because they can perceive the tiny differences in every language, some insignificant in one language but crucial in another
6Infants' brains are attuned to
sounds in their native language. They begin to sort out the indication that each word is distinct
7Entrainment
Infants get on the same train of thought and language as others in their community. They understand the rhythms of speech before the meanings
8Bilingual proficency
Begins very early as infants' brains are primed to learn the speech sounds they hear
9How infants spend more of their awake time
Looking around
10Gaze-following
When someone looks at another person's eyes to see where they are looking, and then looks at the same thing. Requires impressive perspective and social motivation, and infants do it (3mo old)
11Natural Pedagogy
The inborn inclination of adults to teach children. Gaze-following is an example
12Causes of gaze-following
Caregiver cues and inborn predilection (preference)
13Infant's basic understanding/innate logic
Already know how things should be and get surprised when this was wrong (dinosaur and flower)
14Core knowledge
Gravity will make objects fall, moving objects are stopped by a solid wall, and adult gaze signals important information. Humans might be born with it
15Babies' logic
Not born with all of the logic they will display in months/decades, but core knowledge makes rapid learning possible
16Newborn face recognition
Innate and astonishingly adept. Soon they smile more at familiar people, differentiate men and women, and distinguish ethnic groups (own-race effect). Zero in on most important faces
17By the second year of life, toddlers respond ...
as they have been taught. Matter of temperament and a response to early experiences
18Memory
Crucial for the acquisition of knowledge and skills that infants and children acquire in the first years of life
19Infant amnesia
The idea that people forget everything that happened to them before age 2. Early developmental theory, not entirely correct
20Implicit memory
Memory that is not verbal and often unconscious. Many motor and emotional memories are this. Limited by time (immediate responses are better)
21Explicit memory
Memory that can be recalled in the conscious mind, usually factual memories that are expressed with words. Takes longer to emerge and comes from the cortex
22Newborn/infant memory
Very few, if any, explicit memories
23Reason for infants having implicit memories
Comes from the cerebellum and amygdala, whcih develop in the first months of life
24Agency
Acting on the world, people seek it, and it is constrained in the early weeks due to infants' limited motor abilites, which limits memory
25Sensorimotor intelligence (SI)
Piaget's term for the way infants think - by using their senses and motor skills - during the first period of cognitive development (spereated into 6 stages)
26Primary Circular Reactions
First of three feedback loops in sensorimotor intelligence, involves the infant's own body. senses stimuli and tries to understand them, birth-4 months
27Birth - 1 month, reflexes: sucking, grasping, staring, and listening, example: sucking anything that touches the lips or cheek
Reflexes (Stage one of SI)
281-4 months, the first acquired adaptations: accommodation and coordination of reflexes, example: sucking a pacifier differently from a nipple, includes assimilation and accommodation
Acquired adaptations/stage of first habits (Stage two of sensorimotor intelligence)
29Secondary Circular Reactions
Second of three feedback loops in SI, involving the infant and an object or another person, 4-12 months
304-8 months, making interesting sights last: responding to people and objects, example: clapping hands when a caregiver says "patty-cake"
Stage three of sensorimotor intelligence
318-12 months, new adaptations and anticipation: becoming more deliberate and purposeful in responding to people and objects, example: putting the caregiver's hands together to start playing "patty-cake", babies work hard to achieve their goals and learn from repeated experience and gain object permanence starting at 8 months
Stage four of sensorimotor intelligence
32Object permanence
The realization that objects (including people) still exist when they can no longer be seen, touched, or heard, major accomplishment of Piaget's stage four
33Tertiary circular reactions
Piaget's description of the cognitive processes of the 1-year-old, who gathers information from experiences with the wider world and then acts on it, which leads to further understanding, making it circular.
12-24 months
3412-18 months, new means through active experimentation: experimentation and creativity in the actions of the "little scientist", example: putting a teddy bear in the toilet and flushing it
Stage five of sensorimotor intelligence
35"Little Scientist"
Piaget's term for toddlers' insatiable curiosity and active experimentation as they engage in various actions to understand their world, Stage 5
3618-24 months, new means through mental combinations: thinking before doing; new ways of achieving a goal without resorting to trial and error, example: before flushing the teddy bear again, hesitation because of the memory of the toilet overflowing and parents' anger
Stage six of sensorimotor intelligence
37deferred imiation
Toddler's ability to remember what they have seen and repeat it later, occurs during stage six/possibly earlier
38Vygotsky in infant cognition
Stressed the role of other people in shaping and advancing infant cognition
39Joint attention
When two or more people look at, listen to, or think about the same thing. Considered a crucial aspect of cognition, beginning in infancy. Infants need attentive, undistracted caregiving
40Successful episode of joint attention
One person shows, points, or verbalizes about something, then the other reciprocates in some way, and finally the original person acknowledges the reaction
41Child-directed speech (mother/parentese)
Higher pitch, simpler words, repetition, varied speed, and exaggerated emotional tone used when talking to infants
42Infants speech reactions
They react to tone and frequency, and by ~7 months can respond with some comprehension of the meaning of words that are distinctive. They also like alliterations, rhymes, repetition, melody, rhythm, and varied pitch
43In the second half of the first year...
Babies look closely at mouths to grasp the relationship between mouth movements and sound.
44Babbling
An infant's repetition of certain syllables, such as ba-ba-ba, that begins when babies are between 6 and 9 months old. Experience-expectant (all babies do this)
45Baby signs
Communication with hand signs, used months before they can make words. Used in episodes of join attention. Infants adept to pointing tend to talk soon
46First words
Uttered at about one year old, understood by caregivers if not by strangers. Spoken vocab increases gradually while meanings are learned rapidly
47Holophrase
A single word that is used to express a complete, meaningful thought, accompanied by gestures, facial expressions, and nuances of tone, loudness, and cadence
48Naming explosion
A sudden increase in an infant's vocab, especially in the number of nouns, that begins at about 18 months of age
49Before the naming explosion
Names are already favored. Infants learn what to call significant caregivers, favorite foods, elimination, and child. Normally, created words have two identical syllables, a consonant followed by a vowel
50Early communicaition...
Transcends local culture. Parents could identify what criesrunts meant despite infants being from different countries
51Grammar
All of the methods - word order, verb forms, etc - that languages use to communicate meaning, apart from the words themselves. Includes holophrases
52Infant grammar
Combining two words is a great leap forward and requires new neurological connections. Typically happens between 18 and 24 months. At age 2 children can combine 3 or 4 words in the correct order
53Mean length of utterance (MLU)
The average number of words in a typical sentence. Often used to measure language development
54Behaviorism in language learning
Skinner noticed that spontaneous babbling is usually reinforced. Others pointed out that some 3-year-olds can converse in elaborate sentences, while others put one simple word with another; these variations must be learned
55Sociocultural reason for language
Infants communicate because humans are social beings, dependent on one another for survival and joy. Infants seek to master words and grammar to join the social world
56Screen time in infancy
Many caregivers use child-directed videos, CDs, downloads, and apps to aid language learning. Research finds that this may be harmful as it reduces sleep, nutrition, and social interaction. Only helpful when used with adult-infant interaction
57Genetically programmed language learning
Language is not taught or a product of social interaction, but arises from a particular gene, brain maturation, and the human impulse to imitate
58Language acquisition device (LAD)
Chomsky's term for a hypothesized mental structure that enables humans to learn language, including basic aspects of grammar, vocab, and intonation
59Language development theories
Repetition, social impulses, and dedicated brain areas. All are evident