Explain intermodal perception and its importance to perceptual development
What will be an ideal response?
Intermodal perception is a fundamental capacity that fosters all aspects of psychological development. Our world provides rich, continuous intermodal stimulation—simultaneous input from more than one modality, or sensory system. In intermodal perception, we make sense of these running streams of light, sound, tactile, odor, and taste information, perceiving them as integrated wholes.
Infants perceive input from different sensory systems in a unified way by detecting amodal sensory properties—information that overlaps two or more sensory systems. Young infants seem biologically primed to focus on amodal information.Their detection of amodal relations—for example, the commontempo and rhythm in sights and sounds—precedes and providesthe basis for detecting more specific intermodal matches, such asthe relation between a particular person’s face and the sound of hervoice or between an object and its verbal label.
Intermodal sensitivity is crucial for perceptual development. In the first few months, when much stimulation is unfamiliar and confusing, it enables babies to notice meaningful correlations between sensory inputs and rapidly make sense of their surroundings. Intermodal perception also facilitates social and language processing. Finally, caregiver interactions present babies witha rich intermodal context consisting of many concurrent sights,sounds, and touches that helps them process more informationand learn faster.
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Indicate whether the statement is true or false
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