The development of active action anticipation: Children’s anticipation of others’ goals

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It has been shown that people are not merely passive observers of others behavior, but that their perception is proactive as revealed by anticipatory gaze shifts. Even though these findings are highly relevant for current accounts of active perception, the developmental origins and functional mechanisms subserving these instances of active perception are still unclear and disputed in cognitive science. The current project therefore aims at exploring the ontogenetic trajectories and neurocognitive mechanism underlying active action perception. Study 1 explores the extent to which prior information (priors) on an agents behaviour is treated as agent-specific or generic information. Study 2, addressing claims that active perception is informed by changes in situations and environments in which it is embedded, examines whether (and from which age) contextual factors have an impact on action anticipation. Study 3 investigates the impact of verbal information on active perception of others future actions. In sum, the current project will inform us on the extent to which action perception is indeed active. The results will contribute to developmental theorizing as well as our understanding of active perception.