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AP Psychology: The Baby Human To Talk - Analyze Experiments

This document summarizes several experiments on infant language development and communication. The experiments explored babies' preferences for their native language over another, their ability to distinguish words with and without meaning, their reaction to matched and mismatched happy/sad facial expressions and tones, how conditioning impacts their response to sounds and objects, attention to unfamiliar languages, recognition of objects being pointed at, understanding of joint visual attention, communication with robots, and shape bias. The conclusions indicate infants have an innate ability to distinguish languages and communicate intent from a very young age.

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Jeankarlo Rei
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179 views3 pages

AP Psychology: The Baby Human To Talk - Analyze Experiments

This document summarizes several experiments on infant language development and communication. The experiments explored babies' preferences for their native language over another, their ability to distinguish words with and without meaning, their reaction to matched and mismatched happy/sad facial expressions and tones, how conditioning impacts their response to sounds and objects, attention to unfamiliar languages, recognition of objects being pointed at, understanding of joint visual attention, communication with robots, and shape bias. The conclusions indicate infants have an innate ability to distinguish languages and communicate intent from a very young age.

Uploaded by

Jeankarlo Rei
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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The Baby Human, Episode “To Talk”

Analyze Experiments Activity


Directions: As you watch the documentary, take notes on the following experiments that are showcased.

Werker Lab - "Native Language Preference"


Procedure (brief description):

Independent Variable: The two different languages being spoken


Dependent Variable: the sucking of the pacifier
Operational Definition of DV: The baby will suck the pacifier more if they hear their parents’ native tongue.
Conclusions/ Implications for human learning of language and communication: The more sucking means the
baby has a preference.

Weker Lab - "Lexical Words"


Procedure (brief description):

Independent Variable: Words with no meaning, and nouns that convey meaning
Dependent Variable: The level of reaction Nelson has
Operational Definition of DV: Will the baby react more to words with no meaning, or all meaning
Conclusions/ Implications for human learning of language and communication: The baby reacted more to
words with more meaning.

Muir Lab - "Happy Sad Face"


Procedure (brief description):

Independent Variable: The happy/sad face, with the happy/sad tone switched around
Dependent Variable: How the baby reacts and takes interest
Operational Definition of DV: How will the baby react to the happy/sad face, and happy/tone
Conclusions/ Implications for human learning of language and communication:
Weker Lab - "Ba/Da"
Procedure (brief description): *describe the classical conditioning used in this study

Independent Variable: the ba-da sound and the bunny moving


Dependent Variable: The baby’s reaction to the toy and ba-da sound
Operational Definition of DV:
Conclusions/ Implications for human learning of language and communication: babies are the universal
listener of all languages until they are 10 months year old

Kuhl Lab – “Mandarin Exposure”


Procedure (brief description):

Independent Variable: The mandarin being spoken


Dependent Variable: The baby’s attention span to the language being spoken
Operational Definition of DV:
Conclusions/ Implications for human learning of language and communication: The baby, despite not
understanding mandarin, they still are able to pay attention.

Woodward Lab - "Pointing"


Procedure (brief description):

Independent Variable: The pointing at different objects, or the same objects


Dependent Variable: The baby’s attention to whatever object they are pointing at, and if they want to pay
attention
Operational Definition of DV:
Conclusions/ Implications for human learning of language and communication: The baby did not pay attention
once the same thing was pointed at twice, which means it is able to distinct the different items that are
pointed at.

Woodward Lab - "Joint Visual Attention"


Procedure (brief description):

Independent Variable: an object on the table, while someone mentions the item while facing toward/away
from the object
Dependent Variable: The baby’s distinction of what the item might be
Operational Definition of DV:
Conclusions/ Implications for human learning of language and communication:

Johnson Lab - "The Robot"


Procedure (brief description):

Independent Variable: The robot makes noises


Dependent Variable: How the baby communicates with the robot.
Operational Definition of DV:
Conclusions/ Implications for human learning of language and communication:

Jones Lab – “Shape Bias”


Procedure (brief description):

Independent Variable:
Dependent Variable:
Operational Definition of DV:
Conclusions/ Implications for human learning of language and communication:

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