Numbers: Infant Perception of Ordinality

This study investigates how infants perceive number, specifically ordinality.  Ordinality refers to greater than/less than relationships; i.e., knowing that 2 is greater than 3.  There is evidence that infants understand the ordinality of numbers by 9 months of age.  They seem to be able to know that 2 is greater than 3 without knowing that two is two and three is three.  Obviously, they cannot count yet.  The current study is trying to replicate this finding and further invesitgate whether infants’ perception of ordinality varies with the size of the numbers.   Is it easier for infants to understand the ordinality of smaller numbers (less than 4) than larger numbers (greater than 4)?  This is one of the questions that we are trying to answer.

This study, like all studies in our lab, requires a one-time visit to our lab which lasts about 20-30 minutes.  Your infant would be seated in your lap facing a computer monitor which would display shapes either increasing in number or decreasing in number.  Once your infant has become familiar with this pattern (either increasing or decreasing number), the opposite pattern would be displayed.  We record looking behavior to determine if your infant noticed the change in the pattern.

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