Three-dimensional (3D) object completion, the ability to perceive the backs of objects seen from a single viewpoint, emerges at around 6 months of age. Yet, only relatively simple 3D objects have been used in assessing its development. This study examined infants' 3D object completion when presented with more complex stimuli. Infants…

Reports on four experiments on pattern perception in four-month-old infants. The first experiment examined preference for patterns varying in structure; the second examined encoding patterns from different subset sizes; and the last two experiments examined changes in the size, position, and orientation of the habituation pattern. (HOD)

Two experiments investigated whether 5-month olds would look longer at rotating "drawbridge" appearing to violate physical laws because they knew it was causally impossible. Findings indicated that infants' longer gaze at 180-degree rotations was due to simple perceptual preference for more motion, challenging Baillargeon's (1987) claim…

Tested the ability of 3.5-month-old infants to detect audiovisual relations. Results demonstrated infants' visual recovery to changes in temporal synchrony of sight and sound and in composition of objects. Infants did not demonstrate visual recovery to changes in the relationship between pitch and color or shape. (BC)

Three experiments investigated whether 4-month-olds would attend to and utilize the global configuration ("good form") of a partly occluded, moving object to perceive its unit and coherence behind the occluder. Results indicated that curvature per se provided information in support of completion, in addition to global configuration and…

A recognition-based paradigm was used to investigate possibility that past research failed to sensitively assess infants' perception of the unity of misaligned edges in partial occlusion displays. Results suggested that habituation designs tapping recognition processes may be particularly efficacious in revealing infants' perceptual organization.…

Assessed development of infants' sensitivity to two nested amodal temporal relations in audible and visible events. Found that sensitivity to synchrony was present by 4 weeks, remaining stable across age. Sensitivity to composition emerged by 7 weeks, increasing dramatically with age. Noted pattern of increasing specificity in perception…

A fundamental question of perceptual development concerns how infants come to perceive partly hidden objects as unified across a spatial gap imposed by an occluder. Much is known about the time course of development of perceptual completion during the first several months after birth, as well as some of the visual information that supports unity…

Examined perception of object unity in partial occlusion in 72 infants. Recorded how long subjects looked at a display of complete and incomplete rods. In test and control conditions, infants looked longer at broken rods than at complete rods, suggesting that infants' cognitive, visual, or attentional skills may be insufficient to support…