Familiar Toys Research Articles

Lego bricks and the octet rule: Molecular models for biochemical pathways with plastic, interlocking toy bricks.

The 8 studs on a 2 × 4 Lego brick conveniently represent the outer shell of electrons for carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen atoms. We used Lego bricks to model these atoms, which are then joined together to form molecules by following the Lewis octet rule. A variety of small biological molecules can be modeled in this way, such as most amino acids, fatty acids, glucose, and various intermediate metabolites. Model building with these familiar toys can be a helpful, hands-on exercise for learning-or re-learning-biochemical pathways. © 2017 by The International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, 46(1):54-57, 2018.

Differences in maternal responsive and directive behavior during free play with and without aided AAC

Maternal directive and responsive behaviors were compared for 25 mothers and children with complex communication needs using two types of toys (familiar and unfamiliar toys). Each type of toy play was conducted with and without a single message speech-generating communication device (SGD) programmed to say “more.” Rate percentages of coded intervals for maternal directive and responsive behaviors were analyzed using repeated measures ANOVAs. Results indicated that mothers used significantly more responsive behaviors when playing with their own familiar toys than with unfamiliar toys, but no differences in directiveness between types of play. Mothers showed no differences in responsivity or directiveness when the SGD was added to play interactions, indicating that the SGD did not introduce task features that detracted from the mothers’ existing levels of responsivity with their children. Clinical implications are discussed.

Learning Name–Object Relations After a Single Exclusion Trial in 18- to 48-Month-Old Children

Responding by exclusion is a well-documented phenomenon, but data on the maintenance of word–object relations acquired using this procedure are highly variable. The present study included a sample of 80 children, ages 18 to 48 months, to determine whether age is a critical variable in learning name–object relations after a single exclusion trial. The sample was divided into 4 groups according to age. After establishing a baseline of auditory-visual discrimination (familiar names and objects) in matching-to-sample tasks, 3 test blocks were conducted. Each block had 8 baseline trials and 2 probe trials: an exclusion probe (i.e., an unknown name was dictated, and the comparisons were 2 familiar toys, an unknown toy, and a blank comparison) and a learning probe that verified whether the relationship established between the unknown stimuli on the exclusion probe was maintained in a further test trial. The majority of the children chose unknown objects in the exclusion probes. Analyses of the proportion of correct responses in the learning probes revealed a significant difference in performance between the groups of younger (18–30 months) and older children (31–48 months), indicating an improvement in learning the name–object relations after a single exclusion trial in the groups of older children.

“Are we moving again this week?” Children's experiences of homelessness in Victoria, Australia

This research aimed to gain insight into the homelessness experience of children accommodated in transitional support services in an urban setting in Australia. It joins a limited international literature. Interviews incorporating interactive activities were conducted with 20 children aged 6-12 from diverse ethnicities and cultural backgrounds, most of whom were living in supported accommodation. Twelve parents/guardians were also interviewed. Children had experienced between 3 and 11 changes of residence, including hotels or motels, refuges, sleeping rough or in cars, rooming or boarding houses, and caravan parks. It was evident that homelessness adversely affected children's sense of security, mood, behaviour, physical health, education, and overall experience of childhood. As families moved from one temporary accommodation to the next, they often lost touch with the extended family and their friends, became disconnected from any sense of community, and did without familiar possessions, treasures, toys, and pets. Experiencing chaotic sequences of accommodation could leave children feeling confused, insecure, sad, and angry. It could make children feel responsible for their discouraged and unwell parents and their younger siblings. Homelessness made many children expect instability as a way of life. Children continued to be affected by problems that preceded or precipitated homelessness, such as family violence, broken relationships, and parents grappling with drug and alcohol dependence. The overwhelming conclusion to be drawn from this research is that children affected by homelessness need security, stability, and the chance to become and remain part of a community.

Neophilia in domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) and its implication for studies of dog cognition

This study examined novel-object preference in dogs. In a free choice test 17 dogs were presented with a novel toy in a line up with two familiar toys. The unfamiliar object was chosen first in 38 out 50 tests suggesting a strong preference for novel over familiar items. Neophilia may be an adaptive trait for domestic dogs that has helped their adaptation towards man.

‘Normal’ toddlers’ comprehension of the word UNDER in Polish seems facilitated when training about understanding its meaning takes place in situations with familiar toys, and might be enhanced for transfer of meaning to situations with novel toys when training includes contrasts with the earlier developing prepositions of IN or UNDER1

‘Normal’ toddlers’ comprehension of the word UNDER in Polish seems facilitated when training about understanding its meaning takes place in situations with familiar toys, and might be enhanced for transfer of meaning to situations with novel toys when training includes contrasts with the earlier developing prepositions of IN or UNDER1

It’s a small world

It’s fun to use familiar toys like a pirate ship and its characters or a dolls’ house to encourage children to think in a mathematical way.

Developmental changes in endogenous control of attention: the role of target familiarity on infants' distraction latency.

This study evaluated the interactive effects of endogenous and exogenous influences on infants' attention allocation by assessing the role of target familiarity on distraction latency during object exploration. In Experiment 1 (N = 54), infants' distraction latencies as they investigated both familiar toys (ones they previously had seen in a familiarization procedure) and novel toys (ones they had not seen in the familiarization procedure) were assessed longitudinally at 6.5 and 9 months of age. In Experiment 2 (N = 32), infants' distraction latencies were assessed at either 6.5 or 10 months as they investigated either familiar or novel targets. In both experiments, older infants, but not younger infants, exhibited longer latencies as they investigated novel toys as compared with their latencies as they investigated familiar toys. These results are discussed in terms of developmental changes in the interactive effects of endogenous and exogenous factors controlling attention allocation.

Object individuation in 10-month-old infants: Do significant objects make a difference?

Object individuation in 10-month-old infants is investigated in an experiment using a violation-of-expectation paradigm. Two variables are manipulated experimentally. The first variable is test condition (property/kind vs. spatiotemporal) analogous to the study by Xu and Carey [Cognitive Psychology 30 (1996) 111.]. The second variable is object type (novel vs. significant object). The results of the experiment show that test condition does make a difference, while object type does not. Further analysis shows the need to further investigate significant objects, which might confound the difference between familiar toys “preferred to play with” and familiar “comforting” toys.

Looking Behavior and Smiling in Down Syndrome Infants

We studied the relation between direction of gaze and smiling in 15 typically developing infants and 15 infants with Down syndrome. All of them were videotaped during face-to-face interaction with their mothers at home, and while having access to their familiar toys. Results showed that mothers in the two groups behaved in a similar way; that Down syndrome infants looked at their mother's face for longer than typically developing children; and that the relationship between looking and smiling was similar in the two cases and reflected as an increase in the time the infant looked at its mother's face and a decrease in the time the infant looked at toys. It was deduced that Down syndrome infants are capable of distinguishing the differential significance of faces and toys, so that, in the same way as typically developing infants, they direct their affective behavior fundamentally towards the social element, which leads us to consider the affiliative function implied by this expression.

The effect of situation familiarity on the establishment of co-references between mother and infant

The purpose of this study was to determine whether the familiarity or the novelty of play objects available during mother-infant interaction has an effect on the mother's ability to capture and maintain the infant's attention. Twelve mother-infant dyads with 5- and 9-month-old infants were filmed during two 5-minute sessions with familiar or unfamiliar toys. Changes in the infant's visual orientation preceded by a maternal behaviour within a 3-sec interval were studied. In the familiar toy situation, the infants focused more frequently on the maternal referent than with the unfamiliar toys. The mother's verbal and non-verbal interventions were more effective at initiating and maintaining co-reference, because the infant was more frequently in an receptive state. Conversely, when the toys were unfamiliar, the baby was often the initiator. Unfamiliar objects, which appear more attractive, may compete with the mother's attempts to gain the child's attention.

Changes in the binaural intelligibility level difference (BILD) with age

The time course of the development of the BILD was measured in a cross-sectional study of 113 subjects with normal hearing who were approximately evenly distributed in age on a logarithmic scale between 3 and 30 years. An adaptive procedure was used to measure the minimal level at which subjects could distinguish the names of 14 familiar toys in the NoSo and NoSπ conditions in pink noise (60 dB A) and in quiet. Between age 3 and adulthood, thresholds fell by 5 dB (NoSo), 11 dB (NoSπ), and 13 dB (quiet), and the BILD (NoSo–NoSπ) increased from 2.5 to 8.5 dB. The changes in thresholds followed the same time course in the three conditions, suggesting a common cause. If it is assumed that the within-subjects standard deviation of thresholds can be taken as an index of the variability of the internal representations of speech and noise, the data can be described adequately by a model in which the internal signal-to-noise ratio required for correct identification declines with age as subjects become more familiar with the acoustic differences between the test words. Thus, it may be possible to account for the development of the BILD without invoking the maturation of binaural analysis.

Five-month-old girls' and boys' exploratory behaviors in the presence of familiar and unfamiliar toys.

The exploratory behaviors of 60 5-month-old girls and boys were observed as they played with three unfamiliar toys and one familiar toy of their own during a laboratory session. Infants were seated at a table on the lap of an assistant. Each toy was placed on the table and remained there for 2 min after the infant first touched it. Frequency and duration of visual fixation on the toy, hand contact with the toy, five categories of lateralization, and eight categories of handling behaviors were measured. On the whole, the exploratory behaviors of girls and boys were not markedly different. However, girls spent more time than boys did in simultaneous hand contact with and visual fixation on their own familiar toy, whereas boys made more frequent contact with the familiar toy without visual fixation. In addition, boys displayed, overall, more tapping behaviors, and girls, more pinching and object-displacement behaviors. Girls and boys did not differ in manual lateralization. Results are discussed in reference to infants' rate of development, motor activity level, and girls' and boys' reactions to novelty.

Exploring a Novel Object by Preschool Children: A Sequential Analysis of Perceptual, Manipulating and Verbal Exploration

Two studies of the exploratory behaviour of preschool children and first grade elementary school children using Hutt's novel object are reported. The novel object was a box with a movable level. Manipulating the lever released sound and light effects from the box. The task was such that manipulatory behaviour dominated other forms of exploration, like perceptual investigation and asking questions. Children were observed in one encounter with the novel object in which the box was offered together with three familiar toys in a familiar surrounding. Observation time was 10 minutes in the first and 15 minutes in the second study. For the observation of the behaviour a checklist was used with 12 categories. The results confirmed the assumption of a typical sequence of exploratory behaviour and play behaviour with the new object, suggested by Hutt, and Nunnally and Lemond. In addition, boys manipulated the object more than girls (study 2) and children generally dealt more with the new object the older they were however, the oldest group of first grade elementary school children in study 2 again showed less interest in the novel object. The younger girls also asked more social-emotional but not information questions than boys of the same age. In contrast to a strong sequential hypothesis, however, subjects shifted back and forth between neighbouring categories of exploratory behaviour and also between exploratory behaviour and playing with the new object. Thus, there is no clear sequential order between exploration and play.

The Effects of Sex and Toy Characteristics on Exploration in Preschool Children

Summary Previous research indicates that girls spend less time than boys exploring a novel toy. Whether this finding is due to individual differences, sex differences in the toys' attractiveness, or the restricted number of exploration indices employed remains unanswered. In the present study, the novel toy, a box with five manipulanda and three detachable panels, incorporated a sex-typed feature (picture on panel) which appealed to boys and girls, respectively. Panels were identical except the depictions they presented which included a house, dashboard of a car, and pinwheel of colors (control). An independent assessment of panel preference with 35 boys and girls indicated that girls preferred the house panel while boys preferred the car panel. Results indicated that children in both the car and house condition spent significantly more time manipulating the novel toy and less time manipulating the familiar toys during a IS-min free play session than children in the control group. Girls in the house condi...

Sex Differences in the Behavior of Preschool Children with Novel and Familiar Toys

Summary Preschool children (N = 16 boys and 16 girls) were individually exposed to toy collections containing both novel and familiar toys. Boys and girls did not differ in total amount of toy contact, but boys contacted novel toys more and familiar toys less than girls did. This difference was not confined to a collection in which the novel toy was ostensibly mechanical, suggesting that boys do have a stronger tendency to contact novel toys in general.

Preferences for familiar or novel toys: Effect of familiarization time in 1-year-olds.

Preferences for familiar or novel toys: Effect of familiarization time in 1-year-olds.

Validity of the Stimulus Familiarization Effect under Varied Choice Instruction Situations for Young Children

First-grade children (48 boys, 48 girls) were asked to select one toy from a pair either to keep permanently or to play with immediately. Subjects had been familiarized with one of the pair for either 3 or 5 min.; the other toy was novel. Children preferred novel toys to play with immediately but familiar toys to keep permanently. However, more than 3 min. of familiarization was necessary before the stimulus familiarization effect became evident.

The Effects of Toy Novelty and Social Interaction on the Exploratory Behavior of Preschool Children

RABINOWITZ, F. MICHAEL; MOELY, BARBARA E.; FINKEL, NANCY; and MCCLINTON, SANDRA. The Effects of Toy Novelty and Social Interaction on the Exploratory Behavior of Preschool Children. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1975, 46, 286-289. Children's exploration of a large, colorful, novel toy and familiar toys was investigated. Children who played in the presence of a samesex peer spent more time with the novel toy and less with the familiar toys than did children in 2 other conditions, who played alone. Children who played with same-sex peers also gained more information about the novel toy (discovery of hidden buzzer) than did subjects in the other 2 conditions. Although there were no sex differences in information gained about the novel toy, boys spent more time playing with the novel toy and less time playing with the familiar toys than did girls. Play with the familiar toys decreased over 3 sessions.

The influence of novelty and complexity on exploratory behavior in 12-month-old infants

This study investigated the influence of the novelty of the environment and the novelty and complexity of the objects (toys) it contained on the exploratory behavior of 12-month-old infants. Each infant was given a choice between novel and familiar toys located in two adjacent rooms (toy rooms). The novelty of the objects was manipulated by allowing the infants to play with one set of toys during a 5-min familiarization trial prior to the choice trial. The novetly of the environment was manipulated by allowing some infants to see, enter, and remain in the toy rooms during the familiarization trial. Finally, the complexity of the objects was manipulated by varying the number of familiar and novel toys; some Ss had four toys in each set (complex array) and some had only one (simple array). The results indicate that all three factors influenced the infants' exploratory behavior. Ss first approached, and spent more time manipulating, the novel than the familiar toys; they spent more time in the toy rooms if they were novel; and they spent more time manipulating the complex array of toys than the simple array.