PSYC 325: Exam #2 Questions with correct answers
What did Piaget believe about the development of object permanence?
Correct Answer-*out of sight, out of existence
-object permanence: the knowledge that objects continue to exist even
when you have no experience of them
-Piaget believes:
+babies perceive and understand the world only in terms of their own
interactions with it.
+Therefore, they don't understand there to be a boundary between
themselves and "other."
+And therefore, they don't understand that anything "other" has a
continuing existence beyond their own experience.
+This is why they show a lack of "object permanence
What did Piaget think about the reason infants make the A-not-B error?
Correct Answer-A-not-B error
-Infant watches as a toy is hidden. He reaches out and recovers it.
*repeat several times
-Infant watches as a toy is hidden in a new location. He reaches out and
looks for it in the original hiding location!
Piaget thinks:
-because of an infant's lack of "object permanence," they believe that
their actions bring about particular experiences
-This is why infants make the "A-not-B error."
,According to Piaget how do children advance from one state of
understanding to the next? Correct Answer--whenever they encounter a
new object/event/situation they...
+make sense of it in terms of their current knowledge: "assimilation"
+to the extent that what's happening doesn't make sense, alter
something: "accommodation"
-their behavior: if you reach out/ under and grab the object, the
experience of the object continues!
-their understanding: you can't grab something that has moved away
independently
What does experimental evidence suggest about infants' understanding
of objects (e.g., A-not-B error, the solidity principle)? Correct Answer--
Piaget is wrong since infants in the sensorimotor period do know that
objects have an independent reality
+they continue to exist even when the infant is not experiencing them
(i.e., cannot see them)
+they continue to exist wherever they are: the infants' actions cannot
cause them to appear in a particular location
(there are alternative explanations for why the infant made the A-not-B
error
-solidity principle: a solid object cannot pass through another solid
object
-infant looking times were longer for the impossible event of going the
full 180 degrees vs. the 120 degrees
, How can habituation experiments be used to investigate infants'
understanding of numerical quantity? Correct Answer--if infants look
more at the six-dot display (than the three-dot), it tells you that they see
something new/ surprising/ different about it compared to what they saw
before
-and they could only see it as different if they GET that there are more
dots- in other words, they are not just "dots" - rather there are more dots
in the current display than there were in the previous display
Why are two year olds so poor at counting, and yet experimental
evidence suggests that infants younger than 1 year understand addition?
Correct Answer--needs to learn the order of numbers
-needs to learn how to attach labels to units
-needs to learn how to count-on, to arrive at final count
-even though 1 year old may understand relationships between larger
amounts, still might be too much to count for them
-calculations: frontal lobe
-ability to estimate differences in numerosity: parietal lobe
What are the arguments for the acquisition of concepts via Nature
(Fodor) versus Nurture (inductive reasoning)? Correct Answer--Nature
argument: You are born with all of your concepts e.g., face, dog
-Nurture argument: You LEARN your concepts via experience with the
world, you could have a "built-in" ABILITY to notice co-occurring
features. That is NOT the same thing as having the concept built-in.
What did Piaget believe about the development of object permanence?
Correct Answer-*out of sight, out of existence
-object permanence: the knowledge that objects continue to exist even
when you have no experience of them
-Piaget believes:
+babies perceive and understand the world only in terms of their own
interactions with it.
+Therefore, they don't understand there to be a boundary between
themselves and "other."
+And therefore, they don't understand that anything "other" has a
continuing existence beyond their own experience.
+This is why they show a lack of "object permanence
What did Piaget think about the reason infants make the A-not-B error?
Correct Answer-A-not-B error
-Infant watches as a toy is hidden. He reaches out and recovers it.
*repeat several times
-Infant watches as a toy is hidden in a new location. He reaches out and
looks for it in the original hiding location!
Piaget thinks:
-because of an infant's lack of "object permanence," they believe that
their actions bring about particular experiences
-This is why infants make the "A-not-B error."
,According to Piaget how do children advance from one state of
understanding to the next? Correct Answer--whenever they encounter a
new object/event/situation they...
+make sense of it in terms of their current knowledge: "assimilation"
+to the extent that what's happening doesn't make sense, alter
something: "accommodation"
-their behavior: if you reach out/ under and grab the object, the
experience of the object continues!
-their understanding: you can't grab something that has moved away
independently
What does experimental evidence suggest about infants' understanding
of objects (e.g., A-not-B error, the solidity principle)? Correct Answer--
Piaget is wrong since infants in the sensorimotor period do know that
objects have an independent reality
+they continue to exist even when the infant is not experiencing them
(i.e., cannot see them)
+they continue to exist wherever they are: the infants' actions cannot
cause them to appear in a particular location
(there are alternative explanations for why the infant made the A-not-B
error
-solidity principle: a solid object cannot pass through another solid
object
-infant looking times were longer for the impossible event of going the
full 180 degrees vs. the 120 degrees
, How can habituation experiments be used to investigate infants'
understanding of numerical quantity? Correct Answer--if infants look
more at the six-dot display (than the three-dot), it tells you that they see
something new/ surprising/ different about it compared to what they saw
before
-and they could only see it as different if they GET that there are more
dots- in other words, they are not just "dots" - rather there are more dots
in the current display than there were in the previous display
Why are two year olds so poor at counting, and yet experimental
evidence suggests that infants younger than 1 year understand addition?
Correct Answer--needs to learn the order of numbers
-needs to learn how to attach labels to units
-needs to learn how to count-on, to arrive at final count
-even though 1 year old may understand relationships between larger
amounts, still might be too much to count for them
-calculations: frontal lobe
-ability to estimate differences in numerosity: parietal lobe
What are the arguments for the acquisition of concepts via Nature
(Fodor) versus Nurture (inductive reasoning)? Correct Answer--Nature
argument: You are born with all of your concepts e.g., face, dog
-Nurture argument: You LEARN your concepts via experience with the
world, you could have a "built-in" ABILITY to notice co-occurring
features. That is NOT the same thing as having the concept built-in.
