Contributions of Attentional Style and Previous Experience to 4‐Month‐Old Infants’ Categorization

Abstract

We examined how infants’ categorization is jointly influenced by previous experience and how much they shift their gaze back-and-forth between stimuli. Extending previous findings reported by Kovack-Lesh, Horst, and Oakes (2008), we found that 4-month-old infants’ (N = 122) learning of the exclusive category of cats was related to whether they had cats at home and how much they shifted attention between two available stimuli during familiarization. Individual differences in attention assessed in an unrelated task were not related to their categorization. Thus, infants’ learning is multiply influenced by past experience and on-line attentional style.

The Development of Selective Attention Orienting is an Agent of Change in Learning and Memory Efficacy

“…The present results are also consistent with previous work showing that individual differences in online attention processing interact with pet experience to influence 4-month-old infants’ learning of cat/dog categories (Kovack-Lesh et al, 2008, 2014, 2012). In these studies infants’ prior experience with pets interacted with their specific looking patterns during familiarization, including the frequency of gaze shifts between two paired images (Kovack-Lesh et al, 2008, 2012) and the proportion of time spent looking at the head region (Kovack-Lesh et al, 2014).…”

“…Consistent with previous research showing that pet experience interacted with online looking patterns during familiarization to influence learning (Kovack-Lesh et al, 2008, 2014, 2012) we predicted that the influence of pet experience on cat/dog category learning may depend on the nature of the attention orienting mechanism (i.e., facilitation vs. IOR) that was engaged during encoding. We presented infants with paired novel animal category exemplars at test from both the cued and noncued categories.…”

“…In these studies infants’ prior experience with pets interacted with their specific looking patterns during familiarization, including the frequency of gaze shifts between two paired images (Kovack-Lesh et al, 2008, 2012) and the proportion of time spent looking at the head region (Kovack-Lesh et al, 2014). The present study extends this work by showing that infants’ prior experience with pets interacts not just with overt patterns of eye movements but also with the underlying, covert orienting mechanisms that support attention processing during encoding.…”

“…Specifically, Kovack-Lesh and colleagues found that 4-month-old infants’ learning about images of cats was influenced by both their previous experience with pets and their looking patterns during familiarization, including the frequency with which they looked back and forth between two paired images (Kovack-Lesh, Horst, & Oakes, 2008; Kovack-Lesh et al, 2014; Kovack-Lesh, Oakes, & McMurray, 2012). Specifically, infants who had pets at home and also showed high levels of shifting gaze during familiarization were the only group who showed successful learning; those who did not have experience with pets or showed low shift rates did not learn about the cat images presented during familiarization (Kovack-Lesh et al, 2008, 2012). Thus, pet experience may serve to enhance the attentional bias favoring the diagnostic head region and potentially induce changes in information-gathering/scanning strategies in support of category learning (Hurley & Oakes, 2015).…”

Development and Human-Animal Interaction

“…''Cat'' and ''dog'' appear to be among children's first spoken words [Tardif, Fletcher, Liang, Zhang, Kaciroti, & Marchman, 2008], perhaps because they are such salient members of some children's lives. In several studies, including infants with and without pets in the home, Kovack-Lesh, Oakes, and colleagues [Hurley, Kovack-Lesh, & Oakes, 2010;Hurley & Oakes, in press;KovackLesh, Horst, & Oakes, 2008;Kovack-Lesh, McMurray, & Oakes, 2014;Kovack-Lesh, Oakes, & McMurray, 2012] have demonstrated experience with a cat or dog contributes to infants' processing of animal images in laboratory tasks. Even experience with just images of animals has been shown to have an effect on infants' processing of animal faces [Pascalis et al, 2005;Scott & Monesson, 2009].…”