Infants Display Anticipatory Gaze During a Motor Contingency Paradigm

Abstract

Background: Examining visual behavior during a motor learning paradigm can enhance our understanding of how infants learn motor skills. The aim of this study was to determine if infants who learned a contingency visually anticipated the outcomes of their behavior. Methods: 15 infants (6–9 months of age) participated in a contingency learning paradigm. When an infant produced a right leg movement, a robot provided reinforcement by clapping. Three types of visual gaze events were identified: predictive, reactive, and not looking. An exploratory analysis examined the trends in visual-motor behavior that can be used to inform future questions and practices in contingency learning studies. Results: All classically defined learners visually anticipated robot activation at greater than random chance (W = 21; p = 0.028). Specifically, all but one learners displayed a distribution of gaze timing identified as predictive (skewness: 0.56–2.42) with the median timing preceding robot activation by 0.31 s (range: −0.40–0.18 s). Conclusions: Findings suggest that most learners displayed visual anticipation withing the first minutes of performing the paradigm. Further, the classical definition of learning a contingency paradigm in infants can be sharpened to further the design of contingency learning studies and advance the processes infants use to learn motor skills.