To harness the complexity of their high-dimensional bodies during sensorimotor development, infants are guided by patterns of freezing and freeing of degrees of freedom. For instance, when learning to reach, infants free the degrees of freedom in their arm proximodistally, that is, from joints that are closer to the body to those that are more…

This paper reports a study which examined the relationships of various facets of sensorimotor performance to abilities measured by a developmental examination of a sample of full-term and pre-term infants nine months after expected term date. This study addressed three questions: (1) Are there differences in the sensorimotor development of term…

Observed 12-month olds, with their mothers and independently, acting on objects from home and objects brought by the experimenter as new exemplars of previous toys. Found that conventional actions were more frequent in joint than in independent activity. In independent activity, conventional actions were more frequent with customary than with…

An adaptation of the "Stages of Sensorimotor Intelligence in the Child" was used in a longitudinal study of the sensorimotor behavior acquisitions of 24 healthy middle-class infants. Rate of behavior acquisition, variability in behavior performance and relationships between subtests were analyzed. Some comparisons with previous studies are…

Two experiments examined problem solving in 16-month-olds' adaptive locomotion (crossing bridges of varying width with/without handrail). Findings indicated that toddlers attempted wide bridges more than narrow ones. Attempts on narrow bridges depended on handrail presence. Toddlers had longer latencies, examined bridge/handrail more closely, and…