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My
general area of research is cognitive development in infancy and early
childhood. I focus on the early development of categorization and the development of the animate-inanimate distinction, both of which are among the most fundamental cognitive skills. Categorization is especially important to infants, young children, and adults as it is the primary means of coding experience, which in turn reduces demands on inherently limited memory storage and erceptual and reasoning processes. The development of the concept of animacy represents he most basic division between different ontological kinds, and it is thought to be a crucial building block for childrenās emerging representations about the world around them. In my work, I am attempting to provide an account for the development of conceptual knowledge in infancy and childhood, with a focus on the relationship between early categorization and knowledge about natural kinds and artifacts. Thus far, I have shown that infant rely on perceptual features and the functions of those features to categorize objects, and that learning the associations among these properties in turn may lead to the development of deeper, conceptual knowledge about ontological kinds. . |