What Are Babies Watching?
The first study for your consideration in the top ten psychology studies is by Robert Fantz, a developmental psychologist, and it is deceptively simple. Like many of us staring at young babies, Fantz wondered how much they understand about the world. "The eyes of tiny infants look glazed and they mostly seem concerned with the bare necessities of life."The eyes of tiny infants look glazed and they mostly seem concerned with the bare necessities of life. What do they understand about the world and how can you possibly find out, given that babies are not so hot on answering complex questions about their perceptual abilities?
In 1961, when Fantz carried out his experiment, there wasn't much you could do to find out what was going on in a baby's head - other than watch. And watching the baby is what he did.
An enduring feature of human nature is if there's something of interest near us, we generally look at it. So Fantz set up a display board above the baby to which were attached two pictures (Fantz, 1961). On one was a bulls-eye and on the other was the sketch of a human face. Then, from behind the board, invisible to the baby, he peeked through a hole to watch what the baby looked at.
Results
"...a two-month old baby looked twice as much at the human face as it did at the bulls-eye."What he found was that a two-month old baby looked twice as much at the human face as it did at the bulls-eye. This suggested that human babies have some powers of pattern and form selection. Before this it was thought that babies looked out onto a chaotic world of which they could make little sense.
In modern psychology the descendents of this experiment are still used today to find out what babies understand about the world. These have discovered that we're remarkably early developers. At one month we can follow a slow-moving object. At two months we can move both our eyes together and begin to appreciate how far away things are. At three months we can tell the difference between members of our family (Hunt, 1993).
As a result of these and similar studies, psychologists have suggested that we are born with a definite preference for viewing human faces. This would certainly make evolutionary sense as other human faces hold all sorts of useful information which is vital for our survival.
Not a bad set of conclusions from simply watching a baby's eyes! So Robert Fantz is the first nomination for the top ten studies in psychology.
Now Vote!
All the nominations for the top ten studies in psychology are now in. It's time for you to vote for your favourite. Which one most captures your imagination? You can recap the runners and riders here, where you can also vote.
References
Fantz, R. (1961). The origin of form perception. Scientific American, 204, 66-72.
Hunt, M. (1993). The story of psychology. London: Doubleday.
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You would think studies would be undertaken of people who actually remember their preverbal life.
During my earliest months, it was very difficult to see, especially in dim lighting. Forget seeing anything in a room without lights.
My best earliest memories were visual-- they started just before I learned to crawl. I have also remembered a few detailed 'thoughts' from this period.
One was of my mother speaking while she was holding me and I was frustrated as I couldn't seem to turn my head to see her face. When she held me facing her, her head was so big and she had the brightest red lipstick.
Another memory was 'wondering' how long it would take to be able to use my arms and legs to crawl on the floor. My mother said that I was old enough to see if I could crawl, so she placed me on the floor. Both memories were linked to frustration. I seemed to have a sense of self and surprisingly, I seemed to understand what my mother said. Go figure.
I realize this all sounds odd--like a fabrication or imagination or recreation--but I've had these memories for as long as I can remember. I suspect there must be others that have very clear recall of this early period.
Interesting mp, I know some psychologists are a little skeptical about whether it's possible to remember anything from that far back. Usually people can't remember anything before they were two or three years old. Often later.
Funnily enough, though, I was listening to something on the radio a few days ago and some people do report similar types of memories to yours from when they were preverbal. It would be good to know just how unusual this is.
I think it would be a great start if they stopped writing it off as imagination and starting paying serious attention to those who do have these memories.
You can not objectively study that which you refuse to accept as even possibility.
Actually, what mp said reminds me of a long TV special schedule I saw on google video.
It was intitled "mindshock transplant memories" and emphasized how our viewpoint on memorizing processes lacks width.
Hmm, now that I'm thinking about it, I do not quite remember whether it was in this precise video or not...
anyway, I've seen some of these and I was surprized to learn how deeply dormant some memories can remain.
There was the story of an american who is thirty(-ish ?), by now (give or take...) : he was hit at the head by a baseball ball when he was very young, and when he recovered, he noticed he could practically recall the weather of every day ever since he was born.
(I'm sorry I don't go any further into details. I'm tired right now, and English is not my mother tongue...)
Furan, sounds fascinating! Let us know if you come across the link...
Preference of human face is caused by the familiarity of image, already known visual patterns. If baby was surrounding by talking bulls-eyes it will definitely paid more attentions to such things in a while.