Cognitive Development Lab

Looking for something fun to do on a Saturday?  Visit the Living Lab at the Connecticut Science Center!  The Cognitive Development Labs and the Connecticut Science Center have recently come together to engage visitors in child development research. Beginning in March, researchers from the Cognitive Development Labs will be on the fifth floor of the science center on Saturday mornings, and families are welcome to drop by and participate in one of our studies during their visit!

Research assistants Ellen Lesser and Jillian Roberts represent the Labs at the CT Science Center.

This summer, the Labs worked on a variety of ongoing and new research projects. Our undergraduate research assistants presented their projects at the annual campus-wide Hughes Summer Program Poster Session:

Evaluating spatial bias in preschool-aged children – Jillian Roberts & Madeline Kidd (Advisor: Hilary Barth)

Implementing and comparing models of estimation bias in “R” - Adam Watson (Advisor: Hilary Barth)

Estimation bias in numerical and non-numerical spatial tasks in nine- and ten-year-olds and adults – Ellen Lesser (Advisors: Hilary Barth & Emily Slusser)

An investigation of numerical acuity, number line performance, and math ability – Emilie George (Advisor: Hilary Barth)

Numeracy and individual differences in probability weighting - Jason Saltiel (Advisors: Andrea Patalano & Hilary Barth)

The role of linguistic context in children’s acquisition of number words - Angela Lo (Advisor: Anna Shusterman)

Navigation in children: The effect of landscapes on spatial reorientation - Andrew Ribner & Samantha Melvin (Advisor: Anna Shusterman)

Children’s early understanding of the word “two” - Samantha Melvin (Advisor: Anna Shusterman)

Cardinal principle training: The effects of structured number learning - Srotoshini Bhalobasha (Advisor: Anna Shusterman)

Children’s higher number knowledge acquisition - Simoneil Sarbh (Advisor: Anna Shusterman)

Yellow Lab members at the Summer 2012 Research Poster Session: Jillian Roberts, Elizabeth Chase, Emilie George, Ellen Lesser, Madeline Kidd.

On July 18th, the Cognitive Development Labs hosted the second annual SLAC (Selective Liberal Arts Colleges) Cognitive Development mini-conference at Wesleyan. Faculty and research assistants from Wesleyan, Smith College, Barnard College and Wellesley College participated. Read more about the mini-conference (and see some pictures) here.

A paper by lab alum Jess Sullivan ’08 and Hilary Barth, “Active (not passive) spatial imagery primes temporal judgments”, was published in the Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology in June 2012. Read an article about this research in the Wesleyan Connection newsletter here. You can also download the original publication as a PDF.

This year, we teamed up with Mattel to investigate the developmental benefits of playing with toys. We recently completed testing for the Power of Play project and want to thank all of the local families who participated!

Please check out our Power Of Play Newsletter for more information about this study.

Members of both labs presented at this year’s Psychology Department Research Poster session at Wesleyan. Posters covered many of the Labs’ ongoing and completed projects.

Individual differences in probability weighting: Evidence from a gambling task – Jason Saltiel & Lily Kaplan (Advisors: Andrea Patalano & Hilary Barth)

How feedback improves children’s numerical estimation – Shipra Kanjlia (Advisor: Hilary Barth)

The power of play – Emilie George (Advisors: Hilary Barth, Anna Shusterman, & Emily Slusser)

Estimation bias in numerical and non-numerical spatial tasks – Isabel Bernstein, Ellen Lesser, Rachel Santiago, & Amy Toig (Advisors: Hilary Barth & Emily Slusser)

Developing research-based preschool math curriculum – Angela Lo, Andrew Ribner, Simoneil Sarbh, & Julia Vermeulen (Advisor: Anna Shusterman)

Navigation in children: using landmark-guided search and left-right language for reorientation – Taylor DeLoach & Samantha Melvin (Advisor: Anna Shusterman)

Cardinal principle training: Is it possible to teach abstract math concepts to kids? – Srotoshini Bhalobasha, Carolyn Mortell, & Theary Sokhom (Advisor: Anna Shusterman)

The assessment of nonverbal numeracy – Mark Nakhla & Ariel Schwartz (Advisor: Anna Shusterman)

Drawing comparisons across children’s performance on numerical and proportion estimation tasks – Adele Borden, Martine Seiden, & Talia Berkowitz (Advisors: Hilary Barth, Emily Slusser, & Anna Shusterman)

Number development in oral deaf and typically hearing preschoolers – Rebecca Lange (Advisor: Anna Shusterman)

Blue Lab members helped staff and run the 1st Annual Preschool Math Night in Cromwell, CT at the Edna C. Stevens School. Preschool children and their families had a chance to play fun, math-related games that were designed and created by Angela Lo, Andrew Ribner, Simoneil Sarbh, Julia Vermeulen, and other students from Dr. Shusterman’s Psyc206 Research Methods course.

Ariel Schwartz and Michaela Swee both graduated in December! They are continuing to work in the labs for Spring 2012.