European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - December 12, 1988, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Magazine 1 a child mimick an actor. Babies As Young As 14 months have Learned front to How la use a Lay they be never seen before. To can Spur infants intellectual development by Daniel Golem an new York times w Hen inf ants As Young 35 10 month Swatch television they arc not simply Long Al pretty patterns and colors on  they arc often engaged in learning tasks that promote their intellectual development new research suggests. Watching television at least certain kinds i programs can help infants acquire language skills the ability to perform physical tasks and an understanding that what they Are watching is Akolo the rest of he around them. Researchers say. Some studies Are a cling thai television helps Leach  skills Basic to language acquisition in the same Way that Reading simple stories Joan infant helps. Similarly in one dramatic new finding scientists said. Ihal an infant can learn to disassemble a novel toy by watching a demonstration on television the latest research published in the current Issue of. Child development also refutes an influential theory of per Coplion which held that one needs to acquire the understanding that a two Dimori signal image such As a painting or television image represents three. Dimensional reality. The findings Wilh infants suggest that the ability is in Ial othe Little ones can More or less learn from Letevia Ion As they would Hom a Book especially in the. Program is designed or in like sesame Street,".said Mabo Rico a psychologist at  of Kansas. The news Ihal television can be a teacher Lor infants May come As a Iliof to those parents who Nave. Policed thai Khoii infants Staro with fascination at the screen Long before they can talk. Not thai most infants1 Are nearly As avid wait raters at television As their older siblings. Researchers say Ihal babies 2 and under in the United states generally Are exposed to about two hours of television on average each Day. While 2 to 5 Yeai Olds Walch television about four hours a Day. Researchers focusing on the children o Der than 2 Aro particularly concerned about the number of acts of violence in children s cartoons and other programs on american television fearing Ihal this encourages children to be aggressive. Infants under 1 actually pay attention to the screen for about 10 percent of the Lime they Are exposed to it while babies 1 to 2 watch the screen about 30 percent of the time that the television is on according to a study by Daniel Anderson a psychologist at inc University of  Amherst. Between 1 and 2, babies language comprehension is Way ahead of what they can say Anderson said they can make sense of the kind of slow moving simple segments you see on sesame Street but still May have trouble understanding the Quick montage editing Ihal is the visual language of most television  the youngest infants who seem to understand what they Are watching on television were 10 months old the researchers said. It is especially difficult to study the mental reactions of infants before they can talk. Bui in one ingenious study by Richard Davidson of the University of Wisconsin and Nathan Fox of the University of Maryland 10-month-Olds sat on their Mother s laps and watched a video recording while their brain Waves were measured. The recording lasting about a minute was shown in two versions. In one an actress went irom a Neutral expression to smiling to laughing. In Iho other she went Horn a Neutral face to a distressed one to crying when the infants saw the laughing video their brain Waves reflected a pall can that in other research Davidson has Lound associated with Happy emotions. Brain activity intensified in the fed front area of the cortex the of layer of the brain which processes Complex inform Hon. But when the infants watched the sad video their brain Waves showed a lessening of activity there which reflects unhappy emotions. The babies had emotional reactions that mimicked the one they watched Davidson said. Around this age infants become tar More responsive to emotional cues in those around them even if they watch them on television.". Rice reported in the journal of child language that a critical language skill that television can help infants Masler is the Matching of a name to an object. For toddlers Ona of the most Basic language skills is Matching a name to the thing in represents Rico said. In Rice s research  Dafna Lemish a psychologist toddlers 12 to 18 months old Ocie observed As they watched Lui vision Al Home wish a Parent. We found that Iho toddlers used the. Television just As if in were a talking picture Book Rica said. The very Little ones will walk Over to lha to Point. And say something like big Bird " Rice added it. Shows they Are mastering the name Lhing association one of the fundamental skills that comes with learning their first words sometime Between 9 and 12  such learning from the television is enhanced if an adult watches television Wilh the infant and talks about what they Are seeing said Gabriel Solomon a psychologist at the University of Tel Aviv. Apart from language infants scorn to learn How to Deal Wilh the physical world from watching television according to additional research published in in if  a study by Andrew my Lull a psychologist Al the University of Washington babies As Young As 14 months were Able to learn irom watching to How to manipulate a toy they had never seen before. In the study babies watched a Small Black and White television Monitor on the screen. Iney saw a Man pick up a special Dumbbell shaped toy that could be up cd apart. For 20 of the babies their parents then put the same. Toy on the Able in front of them. 13 of he so immediately picked up the toy and pulled in apart a they had seen demonstrated on television. Another. Group of 20 were not shown the toy until the next Day. Still sol them also showed that they knew what to do Wilh the toy by pulling in apart this shows Meit Zool Points out that babies can also a information on first viewing then apply it appropriately a Hon the Opportunity arises even when that moment is much dealer. Monday december 121 1988. The stars and stripes Page 13