topics: |  language-acquisition | spatial | linguistics

Considers developmental aspects - how infants acquire their knowledge of
space.  Spatial competence is considered "a distinct aspect, separable from
other cognitive abilities at the behavioral, computational and neurological
levels of analysis." (p.2), based on  factor analytic studies (Carroll:93},
and Shepard/Cooper:93 claim that spatial reasoning is distinct from verbal
reasoning.  Spatial function is neurologically localizable
(hippocampus/parietal/areas of prefrontal; e.g. damage to some parietal areas
--> can see, name, and reach for objects, but cannot locate obj w eyes
closed).  

But "a commitment to domain specific analysis does not entail a commitment to
the idea that there exist innately available autonomously running procedures
(Fodor:83)".  Closer to Karmiloff-Smith, who suggests that sometimes there is
"an early modularity that is punctured in the course of development, such as
when perceptual codings become accessible to symbolic representation and
verbal description during childhood." (5)

[IDEA: comparing difficulty in mental rotation to difficulty in
middle-recursion? both are a matter of degree, though the former is "more"
continuous than the latter. ]

Three approaches have dominated thinking about spatial development:

A. Piaget and followers: infants are born without knowledge of space or a
   conception of permanent objects that occupy space. They develop such
   knowledge through experience and manipulation of their environment.
B. Nativists suggest that the essential aspects of spatial understanding are
   innate and that biological maturation of specific brain areas can account
   for whatever aspects of spatial development are not accounted for at
   birth.
C. Vygotskan approach emphasizes the cultural transmission of spatial
   skills.

Newcombe/ Huttenlocher argue for an "interactionist approach" to spatial
development integrating some insights of these three. ... biological
preparedness interacts with the spatial environment that infants encounter
after birth to create spatial development and mature spatial competence.

ch.2 Thinking about Space

[landmarks may be] "treated as points (e.g. an elm tree in left field) [or as]
a region (e.g. left field itself).  Actually these types exist on a
continuum, and true point lm's exist only in the abstract..." 15

[representations at different scales / hierarchies - collapsible, but also
multiple?] 

Contents

1 Introduction				    	1
2 Thinking about Space			    	13
3 Two Hypotheses about Infant Location Coding	39
4 Three Other Important Questions about the 
	Development of Location Coding 
	(and an Epilogue on Automaticity)	73
5 Development of Spatial Thought	    	109
6 Models and Maps			    	145
7 Space and Language			    	179
8 Thinking about Development		    	207
References					227

Abstract

        from http://linguistlist.org/issues/14/14-1621.html

Spatial competence is a central aspect of human adaptation. To
understand human cognitive functioning, we must understand how people
code the locations of things, how they navigate in the world, and how
they represent and mentally manipulate spatial information. Until
recently three approaches have dominated thinking about spatial
development. Followers of Piaget claim that infants are born without
knowledge of space or a conception of permanent objects that occupy
space. They develop such knowledge through experience and manipulation
of their environment. Nativists suggest that the essential aspects of
spatial understanding are innate and that biological maturation of
specific brain areas can account for whatever aspects of spatial
development are not accounted for at birth. The Vygotskan approach
emphasizes the cultural transmission of spatial skills.

Nora Newcombe and Janellen Huttenlocher argue for an interactionist
approach to spatial development that incorporates and integrates
essential insights of the classic three approaches. They show how
biological preparedness interacts with the spatial environment that
infants encounter after birth to create spatial development and mature
spatial competence. Topics covered include
   - spatial coding during infancy and childhood;
   - early origins of coding distance in continuous space,
   - coding location with respect to distal  external landmarks, and of
     hierarchical combination of information;
   - mental processes that operate on stored spatial information;
   - spatial information as encoded in models and maps;
   - spatial information as encoded in language.
   - contrast spatial development in relation to various approaches to
       cognitive development in other domains, including quantitative
       development, theory of mind, and language acquisition.

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MIT Press (Reasoning (Learning, Development, And Conceptual Change) series