Do Babies Learn From the Impossible?

Based on core knowledge theory and several empirical findings, infants have basic expectations on objects and humans. These expectations are influential in infants’ learning. Previous studies have found that infants’ learning is promoted when objects previously violated physical principles, while learning is attenuated when people previously violated psychological principles. For instance, when infants see an object passes through a solid wall that violates principles of naïve physics, they want to explore and learn more about the object. Nevertheless, when infants see a person who grabs a ball inefficiently, which violates the principles of naïve psychology, infants do not choose to subsequently learn from that person. These findings raise the question of why expectancy violations in the object and social domains influence learning differently. In this thesis, we tested if seeing someone performing impossible actions by violating the physical principles would enhance or hinder 17 to 19-month-old infants' social learning from the person. We found no evidence that seeing human behaviors violate the naïve physics influence 17 to 19-month-old infants’ social learning