DO INFANTS PERCEIVE INVARIANT TEMPO AND RHYTHM IN AUDITORY-VISUAL EVENTS

Two experiments tested 7-month-old infants' ability to categorize even ts on the basis of invariant rhythm or tempo. Videotaped auditory-visu al events (a hammer striking a surface to create characteristic rhythm s and tempos) were presented to infants using an habituation procedure . In Experiment 1, following habituation to events depicting one tempo amid three rhythms, infants showed a significant recovery of visual a ttention to a change in tempo and rhythm, but not to a change in rhyth m alone. In Experiment 2, following habituation to events displaying o ne rhythm amid three tempos, infants did not show a recovery of visual attention to a change in rhythm and tempo, nor to a change in tempo a lone. The pattern of results suggested that 7-month-old infants catego rized events on the basis of invariant tempo amid changing rhythms, bu t did not appear to do so for an invariant rhythm in the context of ch anging tempos.