Eight-Month-Old Infants Meta-Learn by Downweighting Irrelevant Evidence

Poli, Francesco; Ghilardi, Tommaso; Mars, Rogier B.; Hinne, Max; Hunnius, Sabine

doi:10.1162/opmi_a_00079

Cited by 4 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…We found a steady reduction in pupil size over trials, indicating that infants learned that specific cues predicted whether they would later receive information about the location of a reward. This discovery supports the growing body of evidence indicating that infants are proactive in shaping their learning environment by searching for and focusing on information-rich stimuli (Poli et al, 2023(Poli et al, , 2020. For the first time, this demonstrates that infants do not only react to information but can learn about the informativity of a stimulus and anticipate information before it is available.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

Early roots of information-seeking: Infants predict and generalize the value of information

Ghilardi,

Poli,

Meyer

et al. 2024

Preprint

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Humans face the challenge of making sense of a complex world. Learning where to find information is crucial to filter through the abundance of stimuli, distinguish relevant from irrelevant sources, and optimize our learning. Here, we examined the developmental roots of information-seeking by testing whether 8-month-old infants can predict where to find information. We presented infants with visual cues indicating whether they will later receive information about the location of a rewarding stimulus. We analyzed the dynamics of pupil dilation when the cues were presented, but before the actual information was delivered. By combining additive Bayesian models with reinforcement learning, we show that infants learn to successfully predict what cues have a greater informational value and that they generalize these predictions to novel cues that share the same perceptual features. These results reveal the fundamental learning processes that support information-seeking from early in life.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

Early roots of information-seeking: Infants predict and generalize the value of information

Ghilardi,

Poli,

Meyer

et al. 2024

Preprint

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“…The study was approved by the ethics committee of Radboud University, Nijmegen (NL). For 90 of the initial 164 infants, the data of the visual learning task has been analysed for different purposes in previous research (Poli et al, 2020(Poli et al, , 2023. The remaining 74 infants were participants of a larger longitudinal cohort study (i.e., Smiley).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Specifically, we quantified trial-by-trial changes in the predictability of the sequences, as well as the information gain contained in each stimulus. If infants can track the levels of predictability and information gain that are present in the task, their looking behaviour should correlate with these informationtheoretic measures (O'Reilly et al, 2013;Poli et al, 2023). This is addressed in detail in the Analysis section.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Individual differences in processing speed and curiosity explain infant habituation and dishabituation performance

Poli,

Ghilardi,

Beijers

et al. 2023

Developmental Science

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Habituation and dishabituation are the most prevalent measures of infant cognitive functioning, and they have reliably been shown to predict later cognitive outcomes. Yet, the exact mechanisms underlying infant habituation and dishabituation are still unclear. To investigate them, we tested 106 8‐month‐old infants on a classic habituation task and a novel visual learning task. We used a hierarchical Bayesian model to identify individual differences in sustained attention, learning performance, processing speed and curiosity from the visual learning task. These factors were then related to habituation and dishabituation. We found that habituation time was related to individual differences in processing speed, while dishabituation was related to curiosity, but only for infants who did not habituate. These results offer novel insights in the mechanisms underlying habituation and serve as proof of concept for hierarchical models as an effective tool to measure individual differences in infant cognitive functioning.Research Highlights We used a hierarchical Bayesian model to measure individual differences in infants’ processing speed, learning performance, sustained attention, and curiosity. Faster processing speed was related to shorter habituation time. High curiosity was related to stronger dishabituation responses, but only for infants who did not habituate.

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Toddlers strategically adapt their information search

Poli,

Li,

Naidu

et al. 2024

Nat Commun

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Adaptive information seeking is essential for humans to effectively navigate complex and dynamic environments. Here, we developed a gaze-contingent eye-tracking paradigm to examine the early emergence of adaptive information-seeking. Toddlers (N = 60, 18-36 months) and adults (N = 42) either learnt that an animal was equally likely to be found in any of four available locations, or that it was most likely to be found in one particular location. Afterwards, they were given control of a torchlight, which they could move with their eyes to explore the otherwise pitch-black task environment. Eye-movement data and Markov models show that, from 24 months of age, toddlers become more exploratory than adults, and start adapting their exploratory strategies to the information structure of the task. These results show that toddlers’ search strategies are more sophisticated than previously thought, and identify the unique features that distinguish their information search from adults’.

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Eight-Month-Old Infants Meta-Learn by Downweighting Irrelevant Evidence

Cited by 4 publications

References 53 publications

Early roots of information-seeking: Infants predict and generalize the value of information

Early roots of information-seeking: Infants predict and generalize the value of information

Individual differences in processing speed and curiosity explain infant habituation and dishabituation performance

Toddlers strategically adapt their information search

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