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Emergent Goal-Anticipatory Gaze in Infants via Event-Predictive Learning and Inference.

Christian Gumbsch1,2, Maurits Adam3, Birgit Elsner3

  • 1Neuro-Cognitive Modeling Group, Department of Computer Science, University of Tübingen.

Cognitive Science
|August 11, 2021
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Infants develop goal-anticipatory gaze by learning event predictions and minimizing uncertainty. This computational model shows how event-predictive learning and active inference explain infant gaze shifts toward action goals.

Keywords:
Active inferenceComputational modelEvent cognitionGoal-anticipatory gazeInfancy

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Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Science
  • Developmental Psychology
  • Computational Neuroscience

Background:

  • Infants aged 7+ months anticipate action goals via gaze shifts.
  • Factors influencing this behavior include action experience and agent familiarity.
  • Underlying cognitive mechanisms remain debated.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To propose and implement a computational model explaining goal-anticipatory gaze in infants.
  • To investigate the roles of event-predictive learning and active inference in gaze behavior.

Main Methods:

  • Developed a model based on probabilistic, generative, event-predictive, and uncertainty-minimizing principles.
  • Implemented event-predictive learning and active inference.
  • Trained the model on object-manipulation events with familiar (hand) and unfamiliar (claw) agents.

Main Results:

  • The model generated goal-anticipatory gaze shifts after learning object manipulations.
  • Anticipatory gaze emerged with familiar agents and sufficient experience.
  • Unfamiliar agents elicited reactive tracking, not anticipatory gaze.

Conclusions:

  • Event-predictive learning and active inference are critical for goal-anticipatory gaze in infants.
  • The model's behavior qualitatively matches infant data.
  • This framework offers insights into early cognitive development and predictive processing.