Visual cliff

The mother encourages her child to crawl towards her from the opposite side of a “visual cliff”. Despite the transparent surface, the child tries to crawl to his mother.

The visual cliff (Engl. Visual cliff ) is an experimental arrangement for spatial perception, on Eleanor J. Gibson and Richard Walk back (1960). In the experiment, small children or infants are placed in the middle of a table, the tabletop of which is made of transparent glass. One half of the table top is underlaid with a checkerboard pattern. In the other half, the checkerboard pattern is continued on the floor, i.e. about 1 m below the table top, so that an impression of depth is created.

Children who are just beginning to crawl usually do not move over the side where the checkerboard pattern continues on the floor when lured from that side by their mothers. It is different with the half of the table, which is directly underlaid with a checkerboard pattern.

In babies who are not yet able to move, differences in heart rate have been found depending on which half of the table their head was facing. The heart rate was lower when they were above half, at which the checkerboard pattern was continued on the floor, while it was higher on the underlaid side. Even if this result is contraindicated, it shows that even infants are able to perceive depth.

literature

• Gibson, EJ & Walk, RD (1960). The "visual cliff". Scientific American, 202 , 64-71.