View source for Preferential looking

{{Short description|Psychology research method}}
{{more citations needed|date=January 2011}}
'''Preferential looking''' is an experimental method in [[developmental psychology]] used to gain insight into the young [[mind]]/[[brain]].  The method as used today was developed by the developmental psychologist [[Robert L. Fantz]] in the 1960s.<ref>{{cite news
  | title = Infant perception and cognition
  | author= Leslie B. Cohen and Cara H. Cashon
  | journal= Handbook of Psychology: Developmental Psychology
  | volume=6
  | pages=65–89
  | year= 2003}}</ref>

==The Preferential Looking Technique==
According to the American Psychological Association, the preferential looking technique is "an experimental method for assessing the perceptual capabilities of nonverbal individuals (e.g., human infants, nonhuman animals)".<ref>{{Cite dictionary |entry=preferential looking technique |dictionary=APA Dictionary of Psychology |access-date=2021-06-10 |language=en |entry-url=https://dictionary.apa.org/preferential-looking-technique}}</ref> If the average infant looks longer at a novel stimulus compared to a familiar stimulus, this suggests that the infant can discriminate between the stimuli. This method has been used extensively in [[cognitive science]] and [[developmental psychology]] to assess the character of infants' perceptual systems, and, by extension, innate cognitive faculties. An investigator or examiner observes an infant's eye movements to determine which stimulus the infant fixates on.

==Robert L. Fantz==
{{Unreferenced section|date=June 2021}}
Robert L. Fantz (1925-1981) was a developmental psychologist who launched several studies on infant perception including the preferential looking paradigm. Fantz introduced this paradigm in 1961 while working at the Case Western Reserve University. The preferential looking paradigm is used in studies of infants regarding cognitive development and categorization. Fantz's study showed that infants looked at patterned images longer than uniform images. He later built upon his study in 1964 to include habituation situations. These situations exhibited an infants preference for new or unusual stimuli.

==Summary of Findings==
Conclusions have been drawn from preferential looking experiments about the [[knowledge]] that infants possess. For example, if infants discriminate between rule-following and rule-violating stimuli{{px2}}{{mdash}}{{hsp}}say, by looking longer, on average, at the latter than the former{{px2}}{{mdash}}{{hsp}}then it has sometimes been concluded that infants ''know'' the rule.

An example serves to illustrate the point: 100 infants are shown an object that appears to [[Teleportation|teleport]], violating the rule that objects move in continuous paths. Another 100 similar infants are shown an object that behaves in a nearly identical manner to the object from group{{nbs}}1, except that this object does not teleport. If the former stimulus induces longer looking times than the latter, then, so the argument goes, infants expect that objects obey the continuity rule, and are surprised when objects seem to violate this rule.

Findings from preferential looking experiments have suggested that humans innately possess sets of beliefs about how objects interact ("[[folk physics]]" or "folk mechanics") and about how animate beings interact ("[[folk psychology]]").{{Citation needed|date=June 2021}}

==The Preferential Looking Technique at Work==
A 2018 study collected data using a preferential looking paradigm. The paradigm was analyzing eye movements and pupil dilation to assess children's recognition of different degrees of labels and objects with different degrees of mismatching qualities. The findings support a sensitivity to phonological mismatch in children. The study also provided support for the hypothesis that early comprehension and knowledge of root words aid in converting subphonemic detail to unfamiliar words. 

Using the preferential looking paradigm, Fantz and Simon B. Miranda conducted a study in 1974 that assessed recognition memory in infants with Down’s syndrome compared to typically developed infants (Miranda & Fantz, 1974). Each group of infants were presented with three problems of multidimensional visual stimuli. The findings were that infants with Down’s syndrome were able to discriminate between novel and familiar visual stimuli but were around two months behind typical infant development. <ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Tamási|first1=Katalin|last2=Mckean|first2=Cristina|last3=Gafos|first3=Adamantios|last4=Höhle|first4=Barbara|date=2018-09-04|title=Children's gradient sensitivity to phonological mismatch: considering the dynamics of looking behavior and pupil dilation|journal=Journal of Child Language|language=en|volume=46|issue=1|pages=1–23|doi=10.1017/S0305000918000259|pmid=30176956 |s2cid=52151136 |issn=0305-0009|doi-access=free}}</ref>

Preferential looking experiments have been cited in support of hypotheses regarding a wide range of inborn cognitive capacities such as [[depth perception]], [[face perception]], and basic arithmetic ([[Numeracy#Numeracy in childhood|numeracy]]).<ref>{{cite journal |last=Brannon |first=Elizabeth |author-link=Elizabeth Brannon |date=April 2002 |title=The development of [[Ordinal numerical competence|ordinal numerical knowledge]] in infancy |journal=Cognition |volume=83 |issue=3 |pages= 223–240 |doi=10.1016/S0010-0277(02)00005-7 |pmid=11934402|s2cid=9551 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Wynn |first=Karen |author-link=Karen Wynn |author2=Paul Bloom |author2-link=Paul Bloom (professor) |author3=Wen-Chi Chiang |author3-link=Wen-Chi Chiang |title=Enumeration of collective entities by 5-month-old infants |journal=Cognition |year=2002 | doi = 10.1016/s0010-0277(02)00008-2 |volume=83 |issue=3 |pages=B55–B62|pmid=11934407|s2cid=18258682 }}
*{{cite magazine |author=Bruce Bower |date=June 22, 2002 |title=Numbers in Mind: Babies' ballyhooed counting skills add up to controversy |magazine=Science News |volume=161 |issue=25 |page=392 |url=http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20020622/bob9.asp}}</ref>

==Labs using preferential looking==

* UIUC<ref>http://www.psych.uiuc.edu/~cfisher/LALAB/Projects.html#syntax {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080704052117/http://www.psych.uiuc.edu/~cfisher/LALAB/Projects.html#syntax |date=2008-07-04 }}</ref>
* CWRU (Fantz, later Fagan et al.)<ref>http://blog.case.edu/case-news/2009/08/05/josephfaganmensa {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150209011919/http://blog.case.edu/case-news/2009/08/05/josephfaganmensa |date=2015-02-09 }}</ref>

==Studies employing preferential looking==
* {{cite journal |last=Ball |first=W.A. |date=April 1973 |title=The perception of causality in the infant |journal=Society for Research in Child Development |publisher=Paper presented in Philadelphia}}

==See also==
* [[Cognitive science]]
* [[Habituation]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

* Sheehy, Noel; Chapman, Antony J.; Conroy, Wendy A. (2002). [[Biographical Dictionary of Psychology]]. Retrieved 2019-06-28.
* [[Elizabeth Spelke|Spelke, E.S.]] (1994). Initial knowledge: Six suggestions. ''[[Cognition (journal)|Cognition]]'', 50, pp.&nbsp;431–445. (Reprinted in J. Mehler and S. Franck (Eds.) ''Cognition on Cognition'', pp.&nbsp;433–48. [[Cambridge, MA]]: [[MIT Press]].)

Miranda, S. & Fantz, R. (1974). Recognition memory in Down’s syndrome and normal infants. Child Development, 45(3), 651-660. https://doi.org/10.2307/1127831

{{DEFAULTSORT:Preferential Looking}}
[[Category:Cognitive science]]
[[Category:Behavioral concepts]]
[[Category:Psychological methodology]]
[[Category:1960s in science]]
[[Category:Developmental psychology]]