Option A: Object Permanence And Self-Recognition

Section One

My participants name is Alisha, she is a female, and she is one year and eight months old. I completed the observation on March 1st, 2015. Due to Alisha’s age, I chose Option A: Object Permanence and Self-recognition.

Section Two

The observations were done in Alisha’s home in her living room, on the floor. For task one there were five tests in total. Test number one was to find a toy that caught the attention of the child and then hide it behind a large object. I used her blue teddy bear as the toy, and a large piece of cardboard to hide it behind. For test two, while the toy was in Alisha’s view, I dropped it behind a lazy boy so it would no longer be visible. During test three, I hid most of the teddy bear under a blanket but

I anticipate that she will be able to get through both tasks because she’s almost two years old and because I know her mom spends a lot of time developing her cognitive skills. According to Boyd, Johnson and Bee (2012), in substage six infants can develop solutions to their problems simply by thinking about it, and therefore, make fewer errors in the process (p. 123). Boyd, Johnson and Bee (2012), also stated that object permanence is very developed by 12 months of age, and most infants have grasped the idea that objects continue to exist, even when not in plain sight. Therefore, Alisha should be able to get through tests 1-4 without any trouble at all, and since she’s almost 24 months old, I’m confident she will also get through test 5. For task one, I expect that she will continue to look for the toy in all conditions. However, for the last test during task one, I do believe she’ll look for the toy under the first blanket because that’s where she’ll be used to seeing it. For the self-recognition task, I think she’ll know that the dot is on her face and reach for her face, not the

After getting Alisha’s attention I hid the toy behind a large piece of cardboard, she proceeded to peek behind the cardboard to see where the toy went, and she giggled when she found it. Next, while she was watching me, I dropped the bear behind a lazy boy. She looked at me and said “uh-oh”, then walked over to investigate the lazy boy, once again she found the toy. Then, using a small blanket, I hid most of the toy and left out one of the arms. At first, she walked away, her mom was making food and dropped a pan, so Alisha went to see what was going on. But afterwards her mom redirected her towards me, and I got her attention back, and then Alisha looked under the blanket and found the toy. This time, I completely hid the teddy bear under the blanket, at first, she didn’t pay much attention, she was trying to play with her building blocks, but I got her attention by saying “where’s your teddy?”. Next, she looked for the toy under the blanket and said “there it is” after finding it. For the final test, I hid the toy under the blanket multiple times, and she continued to look for it. Then, I hid the toy under a new blanket but left the old blanket next to the new one. At first, she looked under the previous blanket, where she had previously found the toy. She seemed surprised to see it wasn’t there, put the blanket down, and then pick it up again. However, after realizing the