Cite as:
Chien S H-L, Lin Y-L, Qian W, Zhou K, Lin M-K, Hsu H-Y, 2012, "With or without a hole: Young infants’ sensitivity for topological versus geometric property" Perception 41(3) 305 – 318
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With or without a hole: Young infants’ sensitivity for topological versus geometric property
Sarina Hui-Lin Chien, Yun-Lan Lin, Wenli Qian, Ke Zhou, Ming-Kuan Lin, Hsin-Yueh Hsu
Received 6 June 2011, in revised form 13 February 2012
Abstract. Evidence from adult psychophysics, brain imaging, and honeybee’s behaviour has been reported to support the notion that topological properties are the primitives of visual representation (Chen, 1982 Science 218 699 – 700). Here, we ask how the sensitivity to topological property might originate during development. Specifically, we tested 1.5- to 6-month-old infants’ visual sensitivity for topological versus geometric properties with the forced-choice novelty preference technique. A disk and a ring were used in the topologically different condition (experiment 1), while a disk and a triangle were used in the geometrically different condition (experiment 2). Spontaneous preferences for the disk, the ring, and the triangle were measured pairwise using the preferential looking-time technique (experiment 3). The results showed that infants could reliably discriminate stimuli based on topological differences, but failed to do so with geometric differences. Moreover, in the generalisation task, infants showed higher novelty preference for the topologically different figure (the ring). In addition, the results of both experiments cannot be attributed to a spontaneous preference for the ring or for the disk. Further analysis on individual infants’ age and performance revealed two distinct developmental trends. Infants seem to be sensitive to topological differences as young as 1.5 months, while their ability to discriminate geometric differences was at chance before 3 months and gradually improved with age. Taken together, our findings suggested an early sensitivity for topological property, at least for the detection of stimuli with or without a hole. This article has supplementary online material: Colour figures Restricted material: Your computer (IP address: 107.21.156.140) has not been recognised as being on a network authorised to view the full text or references of this article. If you are a member of a university library that has a subscription to the journal, please contact your serials librarian (subscriptions information).
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