Key Reading Seminar - Infant Research Methods by https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91 en-us 2021-03-08 07:52:33 UTC 2025-11-16 00:17:52 UTC hello@padlet.com Aim 1 (group 5) - looking time studies https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281598078 - cheap and easy to adminster- observational techniques, no EEG (expensive equipment). Not invasive
- can't determine cognition from behaviour - just because they look longer, not necessarily more interesting
- infants might have preferences for other stimuli other than what they intend.
- inter-observer reliabilty- normally more than one observer (however- human error, might miss something, unless recorded).

]]> 2021-03-08 12:13:46 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281598078 Aim 1: Group 09 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281616218 Advantages:
 - non-invasive
 - quite simple to perform – cheap and not equipment reliant 

 

Limitations:
 - A lot of ‘noise’ in infant studies
 - It is a behaviour measurement; what exactly does ‘looking time’ mean? à issues with connecting behaviours to cognition 
 - Evidence that experimenter bias can influence looking time 
 - Different children have different habituation times (problems with establishing a baseline for looking time)
 - Have a tendency to skewed distributions – making them ‘unfit’ for parametric analysis

]]> 2021-03-08 12:19:09 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281616218 Group 11 - Aim 1: https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281624291 Advantages:
- Easy to measure just 1 aspect of behaviour
- Cheap
- More likely to get parental consent
- Less distressing for the child than other methods

Limitations:
- Behaviour is the end-point (don’t know neural aspects)
- Babies might just like to look at things; the author's inference might be a bit of stretch
]]> 2021-03-08 12:21:42 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281624291 Group 10 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281630116 Advantages 
- Cost-effective
- Not intrusive, the child can stay with their caregiver, more ethical than separating them 

Disadvantages 
- cannot control fussiness of infants (data points were gotten rid of because of this)
- Difficult to maintain infant's behaviour, less self aware than adults 

]]> 2021-03-08 12:23:19 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281630116 Group 2 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281644176 Advantages:
- not invasive so the infants won't find it stressful
- less expensive compared to imaging techniques
- easier to do
- two observers which can establish inter-rater reliability

Disadvantages:
- relying on inferences
- can be unreliable i.e. different infants acting differently due to individual differences
- possible order effects as they could have learned from habituation what to expect

]]> 2021-03-08 12:27:25 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281644176 Group 8 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281649347 Advantages:

Non-invasive, one of few methods that studies children’s cognition (alternative to talking), quantifiable.

Limitations:

Inferring, what does longer looking actually mean, reciprocity (copying the adult), noisy (if using eye tracking), looking may not be the best measure of perceptual competence, draw bridge problem. 

]]> 2021-03-08 12:28:57 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281649347 Group 7 Aim 1 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281649634 Advantages:
-       Quick – Cost effective 
-       Clear Correlations visible
 
Disadvantages
-       Sample size tricky to increase
-       Clear link between Looking time and neural reasoning not clear
-       Noise in data
 
Dunn and Bremner (2017) - social looking is better than just looking – Changing object to Facial

Aim 2

Advantages
-       Objective Data
-       Good Temporal Accuracy
-       Easier and less scary for infant than fMRI
 
Disadvantages
-       Poor Spatial Accuracy
-       Lot of noise in the data due to infants moving
-       Babys move a lot.
-       Babies distracted by equipment
 
]]> 2021-03-08 12:29:02 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281649634 Group 6 - Aim 1 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281650522 - cannot be sure that babies increased looking time indicates their knowledge that the vent is impossible, looking time data requires our inferences
-light flicker may be an alternative cause for the difference in looking time
-modern day methods allow looking time to be more objective (eg video multiple and multiple rater)]]> 2021-03-08 12:29:18 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281650522 Group 1 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281652358 Advantages:

-          As cannot communicate verbally can learn about infant internal processes from behaviour
-          Can test cognitive processes through behaviour
-          Objective measure of time looking at object – less subjective than other methods e.g. strange situation

Limitations:

-          Limitations of inference – what does looking time actually represent? Interest in general or aware of it being ‘strange’ ?
-          Low ecological validity – not a natural environment – lab setting
-          Unusual environment – not behaving as normal?
-          Not a massive sample
-          Replicable results?

]]> 2021-03-08 12:29:51 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281652358 Group 4 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281669558 Paper 2: 
Advantages:
- more objective 
- stronger signals because of thinner skull and hair (although maybe cancelled out by noise?)
- Useful since infants cant communicate 

Limitation: 
- More cost
- More invasive 
- Poor spatial

]]> 2021-03-08 12:34:45 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281669558 Aim 2 group 5 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281680342 - Unique insight into early brain development 
- More accurate than looking time- can link cognitive to behaviour, real time measurements 
- fMRI are hard to use with babies- need to be very still- hard if infant is fussy or inattentive 
- ERP- just shows activity, not where in the brain its happening 

]]> 2021-03-08 12:37:43 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281680342 Group 09 - Aim 2 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281684776 Advantages:
 - Give stronger signals (ERP’s) as they tend to have thinner skulls; so less trials are needed.
 - Helps us understand early stages of cognitive processing; can see how things changes with age (developmental processes)
 - They showed the timing of infant’s behaviour (ERP = Time cause of perceptual processing)
 - Infants can’t speak, so it allows us to measure some type of cognition 

 

Limitations:
 - Lots of ‘noise’ in the data; cannot control their behavioural movements, which result in artefacts in data
 - More invasive and can be physically uncomfortable 
 - Much more expensive & time consuming
 - Difficult to perform multiple trials on infants 
 - More difficult to perform on children/infants compared to adults
 
 

]]> 2021-03-08 12:38:54 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281684776 Group 6 - Aim 2 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281692683 - lots of noise in data when using ERP with babies, hard to counter this with a large dataset as babies will not tolerate large number of trials
- studies are correlational so cannot establish cause and effect link, especially difficult as babies cannot explain own experience
- ERP has good temporal resolution, can tell us about order of processing
- harder to understand where things are happening due to poor spatial resolution]]> 2021-03-08 12:41:09 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281692683 Group 2- Aim 2 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281697018 Advantages-
-More objective compared to looking time studies 
-More ecologically valid because they used toys as the stimulus
- Direct studying of the brain relies on less inference
- Good temporal resolution
Disadvantages
- Still an element of inference as we are saying the neurological response is relating to behaviour.
- Noise artefacts from movement etc
- Cross sectional design, doesn't account for individual differences
-Difficult to get children to sit and focus for a long period of time, lack of trials so less data



]]> 2021-03-08 12:42:05 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281697018 Group 11 - Aim 2 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281697744 Advantages:
- High temporal resolution – when
- More of an indication of the brain activity rather than behaviour
- Non-invasive

Limitations:
- Low spatial resolution - where
- More uncomfortable for the child
- Can’t do many trials without child losing interest --> limits data
- Noisy data - influenced by movements

]]> 2021-03-08 12:42:18 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281697744 Group 1 - Part 2 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281721107 Advantages:

-          Objective measure – no inferences from behaviour (however cause/effect of brain imaging?)
-          Thinner scalp – better spatial resolution than adults
-          EEG- good temporal resolution
-          Help understand children development of senses

Limitations:

-          More invasive
-          Brain imaging with children a lot of background ‘noise’
-          EEG – poor spatial resolution – surface only
-          Children movement confound? Artefacts?
-          Need a lot of data for average brain signal interpretation
-          Reductionist?
-          Hard to recruit? Parents uncomfortable with procedure?

]]> 2021-03-08 12:48:17 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281721107 Group 8 Paper 2 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281722336 Advantages:

High temporal resolution, thinner skulls and less hair equals clearer signals. 

Limitations:

Low spatial resolution change in processing might not equal improved ability, expensive, could have tried different types of sensations/ stimulations, not just vibrations, simpler experiments needed.

]]> 2021-03-08 12:48:36 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281722336 Group 09 Aim 3 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281739258 When researching infants, we need to be careful with what techniques we use; because of the ‘noise’ and how that influences the results and how experimenter bias may influence infants’ behaviour. It is a good idea to use a mixture of both looking time and brain imaging; potentially starting with looking time as it is less invasive and if a significant result is found, then move to brain-imaging. Noting, the costs and timing problems in these techniques. 

]]> 2021-03-08 12:52:59 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281739258 Group 3: Aim 3 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281739758 Depending on the aims of the study, researchers are able to choose between a cost-effective behavioural measure, or a more expensive and specific brain-imaging measure. The advantage of the Baillargeon (object-permanence) approach is the ability to collect a large amount of data on the behaviour of infants. The advantage of the Rigato approach is the potential to gather specific time-sensitive data on infant brain development. Both approaches are valid and provide useful insights into infant development. 
 ]]> 2021-03-08 12:53:07 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281739758 Group 6 - Aim 3 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281742884 Researcher's should be aware of possible inaccuracies when making inferences about babies abilities based on their behavior. Various controls should be used to ensure validity of the measure for its use in infants. Where possible, literature should show effects using multiple methods, with different strengths and weaknesses, which counter-act each other; perhaps starting with more behavioral methods before moving onto imaging.]]> 2021-03-08 12:53:51 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281742884 Group 7 Aim 3 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281744674 Infant Development Researchers should place an importance on finding clear empirical data correlations between behavioural symptoms and neural reasoning,  whilst finding a method that is unobtrusive and quick as to not affect infant behaviour through the experiment itself. ]]> 2021-03-08 12:54:20 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281744674 Group 5 Aim 3 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281745934 - Depends on the question being asked/ task
- depends on age, 2/3 months is the youngest for imaging methods- can't talk- can still see cause and effect. 
- aim to use behavioural methods as less invasive but if necessary use fNRIS to further validate data. ]]> 2021-03-08 12:54:40 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281745934 group 14 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281749377 specify how different methods of data collection would be collected  to avoid bias i.e. behaviours and what they mean]]> 2021-03-08 12:55:27 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281749377 Group 11 - Aim 3 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281751440 Researchers could combine behavioural measures (i.e. looking time,) and brain imaging to understand both brain and behaviour and how they might work together for a range of tasks.
As it difficult to do multiple trials with the same infant (i.e. due to loss of interest), a larger sample size could be used to create a bigger data set.]]> 2021-03-08 12:56:01 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281751440 Group 2 aim 3 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281755925 A combination of looking time (behavioural observation) and neuroimaging techniques (EEG) to increase confidence in findings by seeing if the results correlate. Also, for neuroimaging techniques such as SEPs, doing longitudinal studies so that it can account for individual differences and show development over time. 


]]> 2021-03-08 12:57:13 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281755925 Group 8 Aim 3 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281761047 Parent consent should be obtained, and discomfort and invasiveness should be minimised. Combine observation and neuroimaging techniques and remain open-minded during interpretation. Combine object permanence task and ERPs by wearing an EEG cap whilst doing the observation study. Maybe make the study longitudinal, studying at 2, 4, 6, 10, 12 months instead of 8, 10, 12 (rapid development and a young age). 

]]> 2021-03-08 12:58:20 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281761047 Group 1 Aim 3 https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281784962 Objective measures (e.g., eye tracking) and studies done in natural situations would improve the quality of the studies. Measuring surprise in their brain using techniques similar to n400 could make clearer which task (possible/impossible) the babies did not expect.]]> 2021-03-08 13:04:27 UTC https://padlet.com/clarewilliams1309/lrzgl0rlool4xp91/wish/1281784962