Response versus place learning by human infants

Two cross-setional studies examined how infants learn the location of visual events. In Experiment 1, infants of 4, 8, and 12 mo of age learned to turn one way to view a novel pattern. In a subsequent transfer task, they were rotated to face the opposite side of the room. The 4-mo-old infants tended to err by repeating their previously learned response, but within 16-20 trials their performance was comparable to the higher levels maintained by the older infants. These results suggest that young infants learn the location of the pattern primarily in terms of response cues, whereas older infants employ both response cues and place cues. Experiment 2 was designed to independently assess the use of response cues and place cues by infants of 4, 8, 12, and 16 mo of age. All infants were able to rapidly learn and remember the location of the novel pattern when they were given response cues. There was a gradual emergence of place-cue use associated with age. It is suggested that the decrease in infant egocentricity in such spatial localization tasks may in fact reflect an age-related increase in the variety of reliable cues responded to by infants.