Infants' Visual Expectations and the Processing of Time

Abstract

Visual events are defined by a number of dimensions—their location in space, content (color, shape, etc.), and time tags (onset, duration, etc.). The role of time in infants' performance in the Visual Expectation Paradigm (VExP) was studied to evaluate whether infants encode in their expectation representation the timing of events in addition to their spatial location and content. In Experiment 1, 3-month-olds produced more anticipations in a temporally predictable condition than in an unpredictable condition, suggesting that their expectations included a timing component. No evidence was found, however, that infants processed events' precise timing, but they instead appeared to process events' average temporal flow rate. This was supported in Experiment 2, in which infants trained with a shorter flow rate exhibited an increase in anticipations after being shifted to a longer flow rate, whereas those trained with a longer flow rate exhibited a decrease when shifted to a shorter flow rate. These findings indicate 3-month-olds encode in their expectation representation the average temporal flow rate rather than the precise timing of events. The findings also suggest that the VExP may be useful for exploring infants' ability to make time estimates that involve action. The research reported in this paper was supported by NICHD grant HD20026 to MMH and by NSERC grants 50860 and 506430 to SAA, and was facilitated by NIMH Research Scientist Award MH23412 to MMH. Some of the results of this study were presented at the annual meeting of the SRCD, Albuquerque, NM, 1999.