Do Infants prefer those who are imitated by their caregivers?
Creators: name: Thomas, Ashley
name: Saxe, Rebecca
name: Spelke, Elizabeth
Publisher: name: Open Science Framework
Year: 2022
Subjects: subject: Social and Behavioral Sciences

description: This pre-registration document has been approved by all researchers involved in the project as of 7/29/2020 Title Do infants prefer those who affiliate with their caregivers? Start Date 7/24/2020 Researchers Ashley J. Thomas, Rebecca Saxe, Elizabeth Spelke Logic and Hypothesis Infants recognize affiliation. Previous studies have suggested that infants recognize several signals of affiliation—they infer affiliation when they see others imitating, synchronizing, speaking a common language, or comforting one another. For example, 4 and 5-month-old infants expect that an individual who imitates someone will approach them later (Powell &amp; Spelke, 2016). Seven-month-old infants expect that individuals who synchronize their actions, by facing one another and moving in a circle, will move in the same pattern later (Powell &amp; Spelke, 2013). Nine-month-olds expect that people who speak the same language will act friendly toward one another (Liberman, Woodward, &amp; Kinzler, 2017). And 15-month-old infants expect that two individuals who are comforted by a common one, will affiliate with one another by touching and synchronizing their actions (Spokes &amp; Spelke, 2017). Affiliation affects how infants feel about others. There is also evidence that when infants observe affiliative behaviors, they positively evaluate those who perform the affiliative behaviors. In a previous study we found that when infants observe novel others, they prefer those who imitate others over those who do not imitate others and those who are not imitated by others over those who are imitated by others (Thomas, Saxe, Spelke, in prep). This could be because infants prefer those who may be good social partners, and being imitated does not give infants information to that end. (For example, one can be imitated without even knowing it). In a study that was cut short due to COVID-19, we asked whether infants prefer those who are imitated by their caregivers. The evidence that we had so far suggested that they did (when compared to a control condition that depicted other caregivers interacting with puppets). Sample Size N = 40 participants, or until we have a Bayes Factor of 8 when comparing the proportion of time that the infants spend looking at the imitated puppet, across the two conditions (Caregiver and Non-Caregiver conditions). Participant Age Full-term infants who are between the ages of 11.5 and 12.5 months Methods and Design This study investigates how infants evaluate individuals they see their caregivers affiliate with. We are using imitation as a cue of affiliation. Each infant will see one vignette with their caregiver interacting with puppets and another vignette with another infant’s caregiver interacting with puppets. When possible, we will match the caregivers on ethnicity and gender. General Procedure This experiment will be carried out over zoom. Trial Structure: Familiarization (5x); Visual Preference Test; Reaching Preference Test First, each infant sees one of the two videos (repeated five times), followed by a visual preference test and a manual preference test. Then, they will see other video (repeated five times), again, followed by a visual preference test, and a manual preference test. Each infant will see one set of videos in which their caregiver interacts with puppets and another set of videos in which another caregiver interacts with puppets, whether the infant sees their caregiver or another caregiver first will be counterbalanced across participants (See Figure 1). Figure 1. Schematic Diagram of General Procedure, with an example of a possible pairing of videos. During the familiarization trials, infants see the same video repeated five times, with an attention grabbing animation between each trial (A star that rotates and makes a noise). If the baby looks away for more than half of the trial on the 4th or 5th trial, the procedure will be cut short and we will move on to the choice procedure. During the silent baseline looking test, each puppet from the video appears on opposite sides of the screen for one 8 second interval. Next comes the speaking preference test. In this trial both puppets appear to be talking (they move their mouths) but there is only one voice that says, “Hi [baby’s name] Hi.” Repeated 4 times. The voice is a woman’s voice and speaks in infant directed speech. Description of Vignette One puppet is imitated by caregiver, one puppet is not. Here we investigate whether infants prefer the targets of imitation and if it matters whether their caregiver or another caregiver is doing the imitation. First, one puppet will make a noise (e.g. ‘whoop whoop’). Then, the caregiver will either imitate the first puppet by making the same noise, or the caregiver will make a different noise. Then, the other puppet will make a new noise (e.g. ‘eee eee’) and the caregiver will either imitate it by making the same noise or will make a different noise. Half of the infants will see videos where their caregiver interacts with a purple and green puppet (half of which will see their caregiver imitate the purple puppet, and half of which will see their caregiver imitate the green puppet). And half of the infants will see videos where their caregiver interacts with an orange and blue puppet (half of which will see their caregiver imitate the blue puppet and half of which will see their caregiver imitate the orange puppet). (See Figure 2) Figure 2 One puppet is imitated, one puppet is not imitated. Experimenter blinding: The coder who will code the looking preference will be blind to which condition they are coding. The caregivers will also be blind to which puppet they imitated. The videos are made by caregivers using their webcams at home and following audio instructions. Then the puppets are ‘cropped’ into the video so it looks like they are interacting. After we have collected data from 15 infants we will compare the total looking time to the choice procedure for the 1st preference test and the 2nd. If they are significantly different (i.e. if babies are looking for less overall time during the second preference test) we will change the design of this study so that each infant only watches one set of videos. One set of infants will only see the set of videos that feature their own caregivers and another set of yoked infants will see the same set of videos that see another caregiver. DV s The primary dependent measures are preferential looking. . Primary analysis We will use a Bayesian t-test in JASP to calculate a Bayes Factor which will compare the proportion of time that infants spend looking at the imitated puppet in the Caregiver Condition and the proportion of time that infants spend looking at the imitated puppet in the Non-Caregiver condition. We will use the default priors in JASP. We will also test to see whether infants look more toward the imitated puppet separately in each condition. Secondary analysis We will also compare the proportion of time that infants spend looking at the puppets in the silent baseline trials in the two conditions to the time they spend looking at puppets in the talking conditions. Our hypothesis is that infants will spend equal amounts of time looking at the two puppets during the silent baseline trial and will spend different amounts of time looking at the puppets in the speaking Caregiver Trial. This is because the social preference test is a more direct test of a desire to engage socially with the imitated puppet. Interpretation of possible outcomes Below are possible outcomes and how we would interpret these outcomes (preference here could be looking preference, reaching preference or both). Infants may prefer those who are imitated by their caregivers, but not those who are imitated by other caregivers. We hypothesize that infants will spend more time looking at the imitated puppet in the Caregiver condition, only during the Speaking Preference Test. We will interpret this as a social preference or a desire from the infant to engage socially with the puppet who was imitated. Pilot results No pilot data will be included in the final sample. The pilot data is included below. Exclusion criteria Participant exclusion: Decisions about whether a participant is excluded will be determined before their preference measures are coded. Participants will be excluded based on the following criteria: Fussiness, as determined by the experimenter or caregiver, that ends the study prior to the test trial Parental interference: peeks at stimuli during test, directs participant’s attention to/away from the screen during test, does not wish to comply with instructions to close their eyes but still wishes to participate, interferes with baby’s attention (by saying something during the experiment or doing something that is excessively distracting like trying to put a pacifier in the babies mouth repeatedly). Technical failure (e.g with the video recording or with the stimuli presentation) Inattentive: if infants do not watch at least 3 familiarization trials (as defined by watching 85% of the video) Background distractions that cause the infant to look away from the screen during the preference tests. Test trial Exclusions: Infants will need to watch at least 85% of 3 familiarization trials to be included in the analysis. It is possible that an infant’s data will be included for one of the conditions but not the other (e.g. an infant misses the critical portion of a trial during the imitation videos for more than 3 familiarization trials, but watches all of the comforting videos). Exclusion decisions Participants will be excluded and replaced as the experiment is actively running if they meet any of the above criteria, either determined live at the time of the study or when reviewed after the experiment. Other analysis details Researchers will view videos of the test sessions at earlier points to check for exclusionary criteria or to collect reliability data. To check for reliability, we will select a subset of videotaped test sessions for a reliability coder to re-code. The coder will be unaware of the hypotheses of the study and the events seen by infants. Pilot Data Subject Number Imitated Puppet Non Imitated Puppet Other Caregiver Imitated Total time during Silent test atImitated (Caregiver) Total time during Silent test at non-Imitated (Caregiver) Silent_Prop at imitated Total Imitated Total Non-Imitated Proportion 1 Blue Orange 6.6 2.7 0.7096774194 7.1 3.7 0.6574074074 2 Orange Blue 2.2 2.3 0.4888888889 4.7 3.2 0.5949367089 3 Blue Orange 4.3 1.7 0.7166666667 12.8 6.7 0.6564102564 4 Orange Blue 2.7 2.5 0.5192307692 7.6 9.2 0.4523809524 5 Green Purple 6.6 2.7 0.7096774194 12.3 3 0.8039215686