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Related Concept Videos

The Nativist Approach01:21

The Nativist Approach

155
The nativist approach to infant cognitive development proposes that infants are born with inherent knowledge structures that allow them to interpret the world almost immediately. This perspective contrasts with earlier developmental theories, such as those proposed by Jean Piaget, which emphasized a more gradual acquisition of cognitive abilities through interaction with the environment. One key concept in this approach is object permanence — the understanding that objects continue to...
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Purposive Learning01:22

Purposive Learning

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E. C. Tolman emphasized the purposiveness of behavior — the idea that much of our behavior is goal-directed. For instance, employees who aim for a promotion work diligently to meet their targets. Tolman argued that when classical conditioning and operant conditioning occur, the organism acquires certain expectations. In classical conditioning, a child might fear a dog because they expect it to bite. In operant conditioning, a person might consistently work overtime because they expect a...
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Observational Learning01:12

Observational Learning

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Albert Bandura's observational learning, also known as imitation or modeling, occurs when a person observes and imitates another's behavior. It is a quicker process than operant conditioning. A well-known example is the Bobo doll study, where children who saw an adult acting aggressively towards the doll were more likely to act aggressively when left alone, compared to those who observed a nonaggressive adult. Many psychologists view observational learning as a form of latent learning...
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Introduction to Learning01:18

Introduction to Learning

555
Learning is the process of acquiring knowledge or skills through practice or experience, leading to long-lasting behavioral changes. This acquisition occurs through interaction with the environment and requires practice or experience. For instance, mastering a skill such as surfing requires considerable practice and experience, highlighting the essential role of repeated interactions with the environment in learning.
In contrast to learned behaviors, unlearned behaviors such as crying, sexual...
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Piaget's Stage 1 of Cognitive Development01:14

Piaget's Stage 1 of Cognitive Development

863
The sensorimotor stage, the initial phase of Jean Piaget's theory of cognitive development, spans the first two years of a child's life. During this period, infants actively engage with their surroundings, building cognitive awareness through direct interaction with the world. This interaction is primarily based on sensory perception and motor actions, allowing infants to gradually understand basic physical properties and predict how objects interact within their environment.
Exploration...
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Instinctive Drift01:05

Instinctive Drift

331
Instinctive drift refers to the tendency of animals to revert to their innate behaviors despite repeated reinforcement. Breland and Breland demonstrated this concept in an experiment with a raccoon. The raccoon was trained to pick up two coins and place them in a container in exchange for food. Initially, the raccoon learned to associate the coins with food, making them a conditioned stimulus or a substitute for food. However, over time, the raccoon became less willing to put the coins into the...
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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Sep 22, 2025

Defining the Role Of Language in Infants' Object Categorization with Eye-tracking Paradigms
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Defining the Role Of Language in Infants' Object Categorization with Eye-tracking Paradigms

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Infants preferentially learn from surprising teachers.

Aimee E Stahl1, Larissa Woods1

  • 1Department of Psychology, The College of New Jersey, Ewing, New Jersey, USA.

Infancy : the Official Journal of the International Society on Infant Studies
|May 26, 2022
PubMed
Summary

Infants learn more from people who act surprisingly. This suggests that surprising events help infants learn, but they also consider if the person

Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Development
  • Social Learning
  • Infant Psychology

Background:

  • Infants possess advanced understanding of physical laws.
  • Learning is enhanced when observing violations of physical principles.
  • It remains unclear if infants learn preferentially from individuals causing unexpected outcomes.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate if 15-month-old infants selectively imitate individuals who produce surprising outcomes.
  • To explore the role of surprising events in infant social learning.

Main Methods:

  • 15-month-old infants (N=48) participated in two experiments.
  • Experiment 1: Infants observed an experimenter produce either an expected or surprising outcome with a hidden object, followed by a novel action demonstration (head-light activation).

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Last Updated: Sep 22, 2025

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  • Experiment 2: Infants observed the surprising outcome followed by the head-light action demonstration while the experimenter's hands were occupied.

    • Main Results:

    • Infants showed significantly more imitation of the novel head-touch action when the experimenter had previously produced a surprising outcome compared to an expected outcome.
    • In Experiment 2, infants did not show differential imitation of the head-touch action when the experimenter's hands were occupied, potentially indicating a balance between surprise-driven learning and rational imitation.

    Conclusions:

    • Surprising events serve as pedagogical opportunities for infants.
    • Infants selectively learn from individuals who produce surprising outcomes.
    • Infant social learning involves a complex interplay between surprise-induced learning and rational considerations of the actor's behavior.