What Do I Study?

As a product of academia, I fit a number of stereotypes.  For instance, I will talk the ear off of anyone naïve enough to ask about my field of study.  It is not surprising then that I am starting this blog with a discussion of what I do.  This post will most likely be the first of three where I will discuss what I am interested in, how I go about studying my interests, and what my daily routine looks like. 

Today, we start with what I study and why.

In scientific, jargon-y terms, I am intrigued by how children learn to perceive and act on the functional affordances provided by the objects in their environment.

In English, I want to know how children learn about what the objects they encounter enable them to do.  How does a child learn that you can bounce a ball?  Or use a hammer to hit another object?  Or that cups are for holding liquids?

Though these questions may seem simplistic, they get at the heart of what it means to be human.  Part of what distinguishes the species Homo sapiens from the rest of the animal kingdom is our prolific use and creation of tools.  To be sure!  We are not the only tool using and creating species on the block, but we are probably the best.

Despite this fact, if I were to ask you, “Did you use a tool today?” Many of you would probably immediately answer “No.” However, you would be lying.  Sure, many of my readers probably didn’t pick up a hammer or pair of pliers today, but you are using a tool right now to read this post.  Yea, that’s right.  Computers are tools.  You know what?  So are phones.  So are cars. So are cookware and utensils, pens and pencils, and even TV and videogame controllers.  In our everyday existence, we are exposed to any number of extremely complex tools, and yet we hardly ever have to think about it.  We are so proficient at tool-use that it blends into our lives just as naturally as breathing.

How, though?  How do we go from bumbling toddlers, not even able to feed ourselves, to creatures capable of operating even the most complex machinery?

Given that psychologists have been intensely studying children for well over 60 years, you would think that we would have some sort of answer to these questions.  However, researchers are still split over this issue.  Most of the arguments center around the age-old debate of “nature vs. nurture.”  (Yes, we are still arguing about that.)  To be sure, almost all psychologists nowadays recognize that development is a mixture of nature and nurture rather than one or the other.  The debate now is which one is predominant.

For instance, psychologists such as myself argue that children learn about the functional affordances of objects (what objects allow a person to do) through experience, learning about how to detect these special features over time.  However, there are a large number of prominent psychologists who would disagree with me.  Instead, they put forth that evolution has so shaped humanity that we are born with the ability to perceive certain affordances.  The argument between these two sides is complex and, quite frankly, annoying, so I will not get into it now.  Suffice to say, that the field is in some ways bitterly divided.

Thus, given the prevalence of tools in our lives and the ambiguity surrounding how we learn to interact with tools, I find this field of study intensely interesting.  Developing the skills necessary to navigate our tool filled lives is almost a requirement to survive in human society.  However, infants do not exit womb wielding hammers and pliers.  Ergo, they must go through some developmental period during which they learn about what abilities their environment affords them*.  Thus, my goal is to study this development in order to best understand this key facet of our existence.  Because of all of the nuances surrounding tool use, there are a plethora of important questions that remain unanswered and just as many ways to go about answering said questions.  Therefore, in my next post, I will describe how I tackle these issues.

*Note: This is my own biased opinion. Though many developmental psychologists would agree with this description, not all would be comfortable with the language I use.