# So do babies/toddlers REALLY think you stop existing during peekaboo? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 25, 2012, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307 "2012-07-25T01:43:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/21 "2012-07-26T00:36:23Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > “Child” is a meaningless term hear without reference to the age of the child. Exactly. Things happen so quickly that it’s often meaningless to say “three years old” and not “3 1/2.” Back to the original question, from the books I’ve read, it seems that once researchers discovered they could track babies’ eyes, then we got an explosion in understanding a lot about babies’ expectations. IIRC, a baby will look at an object for a certain length of time until it gets bored. If something happens which the baby don’t expect, the baby will look longer. It’s been noticed that certain age babies, for example, are less “bothered” by objects which retain their same shape but the color changes. One research I read about, they would have object move across the screen, and occasionally go behind another object. When it came out, the baby was bored more quickly if the color of the object changed, rather than the shape. From that, researchers conclude that babies understand objects change change colors, but tend to remain in the same shape. From the wiki entry cited above > [@](#): > > The first study showed infants a toy car that moved down an inclined track, disappeared behind a screen, and then reemerged at the other end, still on the track. The researchers created a “possible event” where a toy mouse was placed behind the tracks but was hidden by the screen as the car rolled by. Then, researchers created an “impossible event.” In this situation, the toy mouse was placed on the tracks but was secretly removed after the screen was lowered so that the car seemed to go through the mouse. Also in the 1991 study the researchers used an experiment involving two differently sized carrots (one tall and one short) in order to test the infants response when the carrots would be moved behind a short wall.[10] The wall was specifically designed to make the short carrot disappear, as well as tested the infants for habituation patterns on the disappearance of the tall carrot behind the wall (impossible event).[10] Infants as young as 3½ months displayed greater stimulation toward the impossible event and much more habituation at the possible event. This indicated that they may have been surprised by the impossible event, which suggested they remembered not only that the toy mouse still existed (object permanence) but also its location. The same was true of the tall carrot in the second experiment. This research suggests that infants understand more about objects earlier than Piaget proposed. IMHO, one problem is that when researchers attempt to put terms onto the findings, the terms can be misleading if you don’t understand the research. One example I can think of is that here is research if various animals can understand that when an object is broken up into smaller objects, if the size of the smaller objects is equal to the size of the original. If the researcher adds or subtracts smaller objects, and the animal notices that the sizes are not equal, this was reported that the animals could “count.” Well, sort of, but not in the sense laymen think of for “counting” as 1+1 = 2. Newborns and small babies don’t have any expectations that if an object, say a ball, goes behind something, say a towel, that the ball is still going to be behind the towel. We know this by research on where the baby looks and on how long a baby will look at objects before becoming bored. This doesn’t say squat about our knowledge or lack of knowledge if a baby believes that objects will disappear forever. For the most part, small babies tend to love peek-a-boo not because of the wonder of the mommy or daddy disappearing and reappearing, but because of the connection with the eyes, the smiling and the interaction. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/22 "2012-07-26T00:51:26Z")
> [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](#): > > it seems to me that one needs the notion of object permanence in order to think that something has disappeared. Before that the coming and going of objects and entities is just the way it is. Exactly. People are putting narrative in where there is none. It’s not that the item disappears, as much as that the item leaves your awareness and it’s as if the item never existed in the first place. Think about how you perceive dreams. In dreams, people and things morph, abruptly shift, or disappear, and in our dream state we aren’t really worried about it. It’s not until we wake up and try to put it into the narrative form that it falls apart and we realize just how random and disjointed our dreams are. When we are actually dreaming, we are usually in the present, and we don’t perceive the bizarreness of our surroundings as strange. I imagine it is similar to a baby (and my few early memories seem to take on this form). Stuff sort of drifts in and out of awareness, and you accept it all in the present without question or context. Slowly you start becoming aware of patterns, and from there you start to piece together the fundamentals of narrative (cause and effect, time, self and other, etc.) ---
**Author:** ![Washoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ecae2f/32.png) [@Washoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Washoe)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/23 "2012-07-26T01:47:23Z")
> [@Martian Bigfoot](#): > > Well, it’s probably a good bet that they would figure it out sometime before college. You might want to retract that statement if you were to spend any time around community college students. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/24 "2012-07-26T02:00:54Z")
There are several manifestations to object permanence, which is the ability to think about an object when it is no longer in your sensory perception. The first and most obvious ones are the ones mentioned so far in this thread: peek-a-boo (testing the concept, “yes, you _are_ still there!”), and looking for something covered up. Separation anxiety and stranger anxiety are manifestations of the same cognitive function and all show up typically near 7 to 8 months of age. You can only be upset that someone is not there when you can call up the concept of that person in their absence. Knowing that someone is a stranger requires calling up the concepts of everyone you “know” and be able to figure out that “buddy, you aint on the list!” The concept can be visual (and obviously often is) but blind children develop these concepts as well. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/25 "2012-07-26T02:12:05Z")
> [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](#): > > it seems to me that one needs the notion of object permanence in order to think that something has disappeared. Before that the coming and going of objects and entities is just the way it is. Yes. If you cover an object with a blanket, a very young child won’t even consider that it disappeared. You’ve removed the visual stimulus and they’ll just think about something else. At some older age they’ll begin to react to the disappearance, but that reaction won’t reveal what they think about the object’s permanence, only that they perceive it’s lack of presence. I think by the time concepts of permanence occur to a baby, they already have some understanding of it. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/26 "2012-07-26T03:39:13Z")
My understanding of this is that the infant/totter is taking your intentions like if it was a game and they were acting, though a bit stronger as the game is more there world at that stage. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/27 "2012-07-26T04:07:04Z")
When I was studying child psychology, I found Piaget’s work to be fascinating. His findings were initially suspect because he primarily used his own kids as observation subjects. As it turned out, his conclusions applied pretty much across the board. On experiment I thought interesting (and tried with my own kids) was for concrete vs abstract thinking. In this simple experiment, one sets out a tall glass and a glass baking dish. The glass is filled with water to a marked line, then dumped into the glass dish. Then the glass is filled to the line once more. Then the child is asked which container has more water in it. A child who has not yet reached the stage where he uses abstract thinking will say that the glass has more water. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/28 "2012-07-26T04:32:25Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > When I was studying child psychology, I found Piaget’s work to be fascinating. His findings were initially suspect because he primarily used his own kids as observation subjects. As it turned out, his conclusions applied pretty much across the board. On experiment I thought interesting (and tried with my own kids) was for concrete vs abstract thinking. In this simple experiment, one sets out a tall glass and a glass baking dish. The glass is filled with water to a marked line, then dumped into the glass dish. Then the glass is filled to the line once more. Then the child is asked which container has more water in it. A child who has not yet reached the stage where he uses abstract thinking will say that the glass has more water. Resisting urge to scream. I don’t want to blow up over this again, but I think that is ridiculous. I don’t believe a child understands the concept of preservation of volume until he learns it. Not some magical stage of development. I don’t know who this guy Piaget is, but every time I see the name it’s associated with a crackpot theory that is difficult to disprove. But I think this one can be disproved. If you can show me where anybody attempts to teach young children the principle of conservation of volume, and they can’t learn it, I’ll change my mind, a little bit. But if Piaget didn’t do that, his theory is crap. ---
**Author:** ![Svejk\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ea666f/32.png) [@Svejk\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Svejk_1)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/29 "2012-07-26T04:48:36Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Resisting urge to scream. > > I don’t want to blow up over this again, but I think that is ridiculous. I don’t believe a child understands the concept of preservation of volume until he learns it. Not some magical stage of development. I don’t know who this guy Piaget is, but every time I see the name it’s associated with a crackpot theory that is difficult to disprove. But I think this one can be disproved. If you can show me where anybody attempts to teach young children the principle of conservation of volume, and they can’t learn it, I’ll change my mind, a little bit. But if Piaget didn’t do that, his theory is crap. For someone who admittedly does not know ‘who this guy Piaget is’, you sure are loud. Maybe you should just ask that people explain things a little bit more, rather than calling theories you don’t understand ‘crap’. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/30 "2012-07-26T04:58:59Z")
> [@Svejk\_1](#): > > For someone who admittedly does not know ‘who this guy Piaget is’, you sure are loud. Maybe you should just ask that people explain things a little bit more, rather than calling theories you don’t understand ‘crap’. You are right, because I don’t know if the explanations of Piaget’s theories are be correctly expressed by others. But I have seen enough about his work that there is an indication that the way Chefguy and others described is correct. A more in depth look at his work would clear that up. But if it is as it has been described, it is crap. And there is no lack of understanding on my part here. I understand the claims people make, and they do not make sense. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/31 "2012-07-26T04:59:58Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Resisting urge to scream. > > I don’t want to blow up over this again, but I think that is ridiculous. I don’t believe a child understands the concept of preservation of volume until he learns it. Not some magical stage of development. I don’t know who this guy Piaget is, but every time I see the name it’s associated with a crackpot theory that is difficult to disprove. But I think this one can be disproved. If you can show me where anybody attempts to teach young children the principle of conservation of volume, and they can’t learn it, I’ll change my mind, a little bit. But if Piaget didn’t do that, his theory is crap. Dude, don’t blow up over this again. You haven’t read Piaget, and you haven’t worked with kids, and **you do not know what you’re talking about.** Back away from the thread. (Tripolar’s previous trainwreck on the subject, starting on the second page–and it’s clear that in the intervening year he still hasn’t bothered to read up on Piaget) > [@Martian Bigfoot](#): > > (I’ll bet that a lot of what parents think that they “teach” to normally functioning children is stuff that the kids basically figure out on their own. For instance, you’d have to put a child in a sensory deprivation chamber for most of their early childhood to have them \*not \*develop language.) Steven Pinker talks in one of his books about a group–Bedouin, maybe?–who put a lot of energy into teaching infants how to sit up. They believe that such teaching is necessary if their kids will ever learn to sit. Most of us in the US don’t bother; we figure kids will learn to sit on their own, and they do. But we put a lot of energy into teaching our kids to talk, even though other cultures who basically ignore infants linguistically find their kids talking just as much as ours. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/32 "2012-07-26T05:05:26Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Dude, don’t blow up over this again. You haven’t read Piaget, and you haven’t worked with kids, and **you do not know what you’re talking about.** Back away from the thread. (Tripolar’s previous trainwreck on the subject, starting on the second page–and it’s clear that in the intervening year he still hasn’t bothered to read up on Piaget). If my understanding of Piaget’s theory on the conservation of volume is incorrect, please tell me where. In broad terms, he claims that children do not understand the principle of conservation of volume because they have not reached a stage of mental development. I claim they do not understand the principle because they haven’t learned it, either from their life experiences or through direction. If that is correct, than has anyone attempted to disprove it by teaching the principle to children too young to have reached the proper stage of development? If that hasn’t been done, the theory is crap. ETA: I’m actually happy to revisit this without all the acrimony. Until it was over I didn’t realize the way I had offended you early on. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 5:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/33 "2012-07-26T05:08:25Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > You are right, because I don’t know if the explanations of Piaget’s theories are be correctly expressed by others. But I have seen enough about his work that there is an indication that the way Chefguy and others described is correct. A more in depth look at his work would clear that up. But if it is as it has been described, it is crap. > > And there is no lack of understanding on my part here. I understand the claims people make, and they do not make sense. No, I don’t think you do understand. If you don’t even know who Piaget is and don’t understand his theories, it’s not really worthwhile for you to comment on them. If you feel that other posters are not explaining them well, then it would behoove you to read up on them independently before dismissing them. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/34 "2012-07-26T05:21:49Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > No, I don’t think you do understand. If you don’t even know who Piaget is and don’t understand his theories, it’s not really worthwhile for you to comment on them. If you feel that other posters are not explaining them well, then it would behoove you to read up on them independently before dismissing them. Again, I am not dimissing Piaget, because I haven’t studied up on him. Nor do I need to. I am dismissing a particular claim by others, who attribute Piaget as the source. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/35 "2012-07-26T06:05:35Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Steven Pinker talks in one of his books about a group–Bedouin, maybe?–who put a lot of energy into teaching infants how to sit up. They believe that such teaching is necessary if their kids will ever learn to sit. Most of us in the US don’t bother; we figure kids will learn to sit on their own, and they do. But we put a lot of energy into teaching our kids to talk, even though other cultures who basically ignore infants linguistically find their kids talking just as much as ours. It’s in _The Language Instinct_. Would I could give you a page number but I can never find that section of the text. As I recall it’s maddeningly unspecific and uncited. However, along similar lines, (those lines being the parents’ lack of responsibility for language instruction) he later includes a transcript from a parent attempting to teach his child to say “other spoon” instead of “other one spoon” C:Want other one spoon, Daddy. D:You mean, you want the other spoon. C:Yes, I want other one spoon, please, Daddy. D:Can you say “the other spoon”? C:Other. . .one. . .spoon. D:Say other. C:Other. D:Spoon. C:Spoon. D:Other spoon. C:Other. . .spoon. Now give me other one spoon? Children is weird. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/36 "2012-07-26T06:29:37Z")
John T. Sladek had a riff on the “constant volume” experiment. The experimenter pours the water from the tall skinny glass into the short fat glass, and asks which one had the most water in it. The subject picked the tall skinny one. He shook it, and the last couple of drops dripped out. “…By that much, anyway.” ---
**Author:** ![Bozuit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/edb3f5/32.png) [@Bozuit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bozuit)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/37 "2012-07-26T07:35:36Z")
> [@Jragon](#): > > Second, and what I think is the main problem, is that babies at least seem to have a concept that people tend to them. If they didn’t believe anything they couldn’t directly observe at that moment existed, it doesn’t seem likely that they’d bother crying. IANADP but isn’t this a fallacy in the first place? Young birds call out for food and many other young animals prefer to be in the company of parents, but it doesn’t mean they’ve worked anything out. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 10:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/38 "2012-07-26T10:07:32Z")
> [@FuzzyOgre](#): > > In first grade I was one of the kids that didn’t take to reading. My teacher pulled a few of us aside for individual instruction. > > After she explained to me that words are little pictures, and they are put together to tell a story. She explained just as pictures has elements(birds, trees, the sun), words do too; the letters. Each page of our books had two ways of showing the same thing. That’s similar to how Dad inadvertently taught me to read, I asked “what are you doing?” and he explained 🙂 Your post was beautiful. ---
**Author:** ![FuzzyOgre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@FuzzyOgre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FuzzyOgre)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 10:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/39 "2012-07-26T10:53:03Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > That’s similar to how Dad inadvertently taught me to read, I asked “what are you doing?” and he explained 🙂 > > Your post was beautiful. Thanks. You should tell your story. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307/40 "2012-07-26T12:01:58Z")
Not much more to it than what I already said: He’d read the newspaper every day, and I was intrigued by this. So one day, I went up to him and asked “Daddy, what are you doing?” “I’m reading. Here, let me explain,” and he pulled me up to his lap and explained about letters being pictures for word-noises and that these things called “newspapers” and “magazines” and “books” used letters to tell stories. Now, this all took place in Spanish, which is a lot easier than English phonetically, to the point where about 15% of my kindergarten class were able to read when kindergarten started (not necessarily fast, or well, but read-read and not just recognize a few letters); a few sessions of “what does that say?” were enough for me to figure out which pictures meant which sounds. By the time the bitch at the daycare called my parents to yell at them for “forcing their poor little daughter to learn to read” and my parents looked at each other and said “you taught her to read?” “no I didn’t!”, I’d been reading printed material for a while (I couldn’t read handwriting at that point). They’d thought I was just looking at the pictures - and I was, the pictures of words! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-do-babies-toddlers-really-think-you-stop-existing-during-peekaboo/629307.md?page=3)