Infant perception of the invariant shape of objects varying in slant.
In a previous study employing habituation-recovery techniques, partial confirmation for shape constancy in 12-week-old infants was found. The infants may have been responding to changes in slant or slant-related cues, leaving unresolved the question of whether shape perception should be considered proximal (retinal) or distal (objective). In the present experiment 12-week-old infants were desensitized to changes in slant prior to test. Following habituation to a shape exposed at varying slants, magnitude of recovery was overwhelmingly greater for a different shape than for the same shape, indicating that the constant real shape of the habituated figure had been perceived across rotational transformations.
D003867:Depth Perception; D004193:Discrimination Learning; D005260:Female; D005403:Fixation, Ocular; D005556:Form Perception; D006185:Habituation, Psychophysiologic; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008297:Male; D009949:Orientation