The project will explore the striking phenomenon that 18-24 month old children, when disoriented, will search for a hidden toy by using the overall shape of the room but not coloured landmarks such as a blue wall. Past theories of this effect have suggested that children cannot access landmarks to guide search, until they can encode them by language. We will test an alternative theory based on current understanding of the organization of the visual brain. Colour and object recognition, and geometrical information about locations and actions, are analysed in the separate 'ventral' and 'dorsal' streams. Even though both streams are functioning, the children's search performance may therefore be limited by immaturity in integrating information about objects and planned actions from the two streams. We will test the generality of this idea by testing children's performance on a range of other tasks that require children to remember how 'dorsal' and 'ventral' features are linked. The studies will provide new information on how visuospatial systems interact in cognitive development, and should refine and deepen theoretical debates on the 'modularity' of cognition and its development.
Empirical data from behavioural tasks with 18-24 month old children