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. 2006 Nov;9(6):F59-64.
doi: 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2006.00530.x.

The development of area discrimination and its implications for number representation in infancy

Elizabeth M Brannon  1 , Donna Lutz, Sara Cordes
Affiliations

The development of area discrimination and its implications for number representation in infancy

Elizabeth M Brannon et al. Dev Sci. 2006 Nov.

Abstract

This paper investigates the ability of infants to attend to continuous stimulus variables and how this capacity relates to the representation of number. We examined the change in area needed by 6-month-old infants to detect a difference in the size of a single element (Elmo face). Infants successfully discriminated a 1:4, 1:3 and 1:2 change in the area of the Elmo face but failed to discriminate a 2:3 change. In addition, the novelty preference was linearly related to the ratio difference between the novel and familiar area. Results suggest that Weber's Law holds for area discriminations in infancy and also reveal that at 6 months of age infants are equally sensitive to number, time and area.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Schematic representation of the ratios of the stimuli used in Experiment 1.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Average looking times for infants in Experiment 1 to the novel and familiar surface areas by ratio condition.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Difference in looking time (novel-familiar) for the 4 conditions. Error bars reflect standard errors.
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References

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