Early understanding of cues of possession

Early understanding of cues of possession The concept of ownership refers to a particular relationship between several individuals and an object. The relationship consists of the power of an individual to establish and maintain control over an object and the possibility to exclude others from that object. At a basic level, objects’ ownership is expressed and recognized by others through a set of spatial-temporal cues such as subject-object physical proximity or contact, actual control, and first possession. The ability to identify these cues and respect others’ possession early in life enables children to avoid conflict and build stable relationships with peers. The aim of this research is to examine the cognitive bases of sense of ownership and to explore how the understanding of the social norms concerning ownership evolve during the first year of life. In two experimental studies, I examined (a) infants’ ability to identify physical cues of possession, (b) infants’ ability to recognize violation of possession, and (c) infants’ ability to respect others’ possession. A key goal of this research was to examine ownership cognition adopting two different methodological approaches: a classical visual paradigm where the infant was observing a subject-object interaction (Study1), and an interactive paradigm where the infant was directly involved in a subject-object interaction (Study 2). In Study 1, I focused my investigation on ownership understanding analyzing infants’ social-cognitive abilities from a third-person perspective. Specifically, I presented 6 and 9-month-old infants with a set of non-verbal video animations representing object-oriented goal scenarios and interactions between two animated agents. Results from these experiments suggest that, as third-party observers, infants seem to recognize others’ possession by showing interest when possession is violated and, possibly, the social rules concerning ownership. In Study 2, I focused on ownership cognition by analyzing infants’ behavior from a first-person perspective. Specifically, my questions concerned how and when the abilities to respect others’ possession emerge during development and how the acquisition process (i.e., the act of taking possession of an object) could be affected by others’ possession. The aim of this study was to analyze infants’ behavior in a choice task involving two objects. Depending on the condition, one of the two objects could be either in physical contact or in proximity with the experimenter’s hand. Results suggest that the mechanisms that elicit respect of possession emerge quite early during development. Nevertheless, the acquisition process seems to be affected by the co-occurrence of different mechanisms that drive the infant’s preference toward one of the objects. I hypothesize that the competition between these mechanisms leads to different outcomes depending on the infant’s socio-cognitive skills and motor abilities and on the context where the subject-object interaction occurs. Despite the growing interest in the development of the notion of ownership and property rights, only very few experimental studies have investigated the understanding of possessive relationship in preverbal infants, and their ability to respect others’ possession. Results of the research presented here suggest a very early emergence of these abilities, supporting the idea that some of the mechanisms responsible for dealing with ownership recognition are rooted in our evolutionary history and probably shared with other animal species.