Abstract
Influential developmental theories claim that infants rely on goals when visually anticipating actions. A widely noticed study suggested that 11-month-olds anticipate that a hand continues to grasp the same object even when it swapped position with another object (Cannon, E., & Woodward, A. L. (2012). Infants generate goal-based action predictions. Developmental Science, 15, 292–298.). Yet, other studies found such flexible goal-directed anticipations only from later ages on. Given the theoretical relevance of this phenomenon and given these contradicting findings, the current work investigated in two different studies and labs, whether infants indeed flexibly anticipate an action goal. Study 1 (N = 144) investigated by means of five experiments, under which circumstances (e.g., animated agent, human agent) 12-month-olds show flexible goal anticipation abilities. Study 2 (N = 104) presented 11-, 32-month-olds and adults both a human grasping action as well as a non-human action. In none of the experiments did infants flexibly anticipate the action based on the goal, but rather on the movement path, irrespective of the type of agent. Although one experiment contained a direct replication of Cannon and Woodward (2012), we were not able to replicate their findings. Overall our work challenges the view that infants are able to flexibly anticipate action goals from early on, but rather rely on movement patterns when processing other’s actions.
Highlights
During the first year of life, infants start to visually anticipate other people’s actions (Adam et al, 2016; Ambrosini et al, 2013; Cannon & Woodward, 2012; Daum, Gampe, Wronski, & Attig, 2016; Falck-Ytter, Gredebäck, & von Hofsten, 2006)
The findings show that 12-month-olds learned to correctly anticipate the reappearance of the agent by the end of the familiarization phase
In the test trials, infants anticipated the action based on the location of the goal object and not on its identity
Summary
During the first year of life, infants start to visually anticipate other people’s actions (Adam et al, 2016; Ambrosini et al, 2013; Cannon & Woodward, 2012; Daum, Gampe, Wronski, & Attig, 2016; Falck-Ytter, Gredebäck, & von Hofsten, 2006). It has been suggested that action anticipation depends on whether a human or a non-human agent is performing the action (Cannon & Woodward, 2012; Daum, Attig, Gunawan, Prinz, & Gredebäck, 2012; Kanakogi & Itakura, 2011) and that movement characteristics of actions such as distances, durations and velocities have a strong impact on the anticipation of the goal of observed actions (Daum, Gampe et al, 2016). Infant Behavior and Development 57 (2019) 101340 that investigated whether infants and adults are able to visually anticipate an action goal when two goals are available and whether they differentiate between human and non-human (i.e. animated) agents
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