What does it look like and what can it do? Category structure influences how infants categorize.
Despite a large body of research demonstrating the kinds of categories to which infants respond, few studies have directly assessed how infants' categorization unfolds over time. Four experiments used a visual familiarization task to evaluate 10-month-old infants' (N = 98) learning of exemplars characterized by commonalities in appearance or function. When learning exemplars with a common function, infants initially responded to the common feature, apparently forming a category, and only learned the individual features with more extensive familiarization. When learning exemplars with a common appearance, infants initially learned the individual features and apparently only formed a category with more extensive familiarization. The results are discussed in terms of models of category learning.
Horst
Jessica S
JS
University of Iowa, Iowa City, 52242, USA.
Oakes
Lisa M
LM
Madole
Kelly L
KL
D001245:Association Learning; D001288:Attention; D001307:Auditory Perception; D003118:Color Perception; D032882:Comprehension; D003210:Concept Formation; D004193:Discrimination Learning; D005260:Female; D005795:Generalization, Stimulus; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008297:Male; D009949:Orientation; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D002666:Psychology, Child; D011597:Psychomotor Performance; D011601:Psychophysics