Babies Are Born With 'Intuitive Physics' Knowledge, Says Researcher

While it may appear that infants are helpless creatures that only blink, eat, cry and sleep, one University of Missouri researcher says that studies indicate infant brains come equipped with knowledge of "intuitive physics."

"In the MU Developmental Cognition Lab, we study infant knowledge of the world by measuring a child's gaze when presented with different scenarios," said Kristy vanMarle, an assistant professor in the Department of Psychological Sciences in the College of Arts and Science. "We believe that infants are born with expectations about the objects around them, even though that knowledge is a skill that's never been taught. As the child develops, this knowledge is refined and eventually leads to the abilities we use as adults."

In a review of related scientific literature from the past 30 years, vanMarle and Susan Hespos of Northwestern University found that the evidence for intuitive physics occurs in infants as young as two months -- the earliest age at which testing can occur. At that age, infants show an understanding that unsupported objects will fall and that hidden objects do not cease to exist. Scientific testing also has shown that by five months, infants have an expectation that non-cohesive substances like sand or water are not solid. In a previous publication, vanMarle found that children as young as 10 months consistently choose larger amounts when presented with two different amounts of food substance.

"We believe that infants are born with the ability to form expectations and they use these expectations basically to predict the future," vanMarle said. "Intuitive physics include skills that adults use all the time. For example, when a glass of milk falls off the table, a person might try to catch the cup, but they are not likely to try to catch the milk that spills out. The person doesn't have to consciously think about what to do because the brain processes the information and the person simply reacts. The majority of an adult's everyday interactions with the world are automatic, and we believe infants have the same ability to form expectations, predicting the behavior of objects and substances with which they interact."

While the intuitive physics knowledge is believed to be present at birth, vanMarle believes parents can assist skill development through normal interaction, such as playing and talking with the child and encouraging him/her to interact with objects.

"Despite the intuitive physics knowledge, a parent probably cannot do much to 'get their child ahead' at the infant stage, including exposing him or her to videos marketed to improve math or language skills," vanMarle said. "Natural interaction with the child, such as talking to him/her, playing peek-a-boo, and allowing him/her to handle safe objects, is the best method for child development. Natural interaction with the parent and objects in the world gives the child all the input that evolution has prepared the child to seek, accept and use to develop intuitive physics."

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Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can.

i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg.
The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at
Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a
wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be
in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed
it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey
lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I
awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!

How Human Vision Perceives Rapid Changes: Brain Predicts Consequences of Eye Movements Based on What We See Next

A team of researchers has demonstrated that the brain predicts consequences of our eye movements based on what we see next. The findings, which appear in the journal Nature Neuroscience, have implications for understanding human attention and applications to robotics.

The study was conducted by researchers at University Paris Descartes, New York University's Department of Psychology, and Ludwig-Maximilian University in Munich.
Our eyes jump rapidly about three times each second to capture new visual information, and with each jump a new view of the world falls onto the retina -- a layer of visual receptors on the back of the eye. However, we do not experience this jerky sequence of images; rather, we see a stable world.
In the Nature Neuroscience study, the researchers examined how visual attention is redeployed just before the eye movement in order to keep track of targets and prepare for actions towards these target's locations following the eye movement.
In their experiments, the researchers asked human subjects to visually track a series of objects -- six grey squares located in different areas of the subjects' field of vision -- while they were making a sequence of rapid eye movements. To monitor the deployment of visual attention, the researchers had the subjects detect a tilted slash among vertical slashes presented at only one of those six locations. The researchers gauged the subjects' ability to detect the orientation of the tilted slash as a way of monitoring which locations received more attention just before the eye movement.
Their results showed that just before the eyes move to a new location, attention is drawn to the targets of interest and also shifted to the locations that the targets will have once the eyes had moved. This process speeds up subsequent eye movements to those targets.
"Our results show that shifts of visual attention precede rapid eye movements, improving accuracy in identifying objects in the visual field and speeding our future actions to those objects," explained Martin Rolfs, one of the study's co-authors and a post-doctoral fellow in NYU's Department of Psychology.