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The population group with which one associates curiosity the most is children. To this day, however, only two caregiver reports have been developed to capture variability in children’s curiosity (Piotrowski et al., 2014; Lee et al., 2023). Both are based on specific theoretical frameworks: the interest-deprivation theory (Litman & Jimerson, 2004) and the violation of expectation framework (e.g., Stahl & Feigenson, 2015). Here, we present a novel measure of general curiosity for children between the ages of 2 and 5 years, in which curiosity is captured more broadly where behavioral expressions were not constrained to any specific theoretical framework. The measure is based on the recently created Infant and Toddler Curiosity Questionnaire (ITCQ; Altmann et al., in prep), currently undergoing validation, which is applicable to infants up to 2 years of age. For the novel Early Child Curiosity Questionnaire (EECQ), we adapted and extended the item list to capture how this slightly older age group may explore their environment to learn about it. The new questionnaire consists of 41 items covering various exploratory behaviors such as “My child pokes at and probes objects to see how they feel (e.g., cotton balls, play dough, tree bark, etc.)” and “My child typically seeks clarification for things they do not understand (e.g., how something works)”. Caregivers are asked to consider the last six months and rate each item on a 7-point Likert scale from 1 (‘strongly disagree’) to 7 (‘strongly agree’) as to how well it reflects their child’s typical behavior. The measure is currently being piloted in the UK, Germany and the Netherlands; thus, we aim to present preliminary results of this international collaboration. The measure will be further developed, and its convergent and discriminant validity evaluated, establishing its internal and external validity for capturing individual differences in curiosity. As a result of this work, the newly developed EECQ will help us better

There are numerous theoretical frameworks attempting to define and explain curiosity, such as the knowledge gap theory (Loewenstein, 1994), the interest-deprivation theory (Litman & Jimerson, 2004), as well as the early, influential specifications of Berlyne (e.g. epistemic vs. perceptual curiosity and specific vs. diverse exploration, 1960). However, the concept remains elusive with open questions especially regarding its emergence and mechanisms in infancy. While there are several self-report measures for adult and some for child curiosity relating to the aforementioned theories, there has not been any measure developed yet for infants. Here, we present a newly developed caregiver-report questionnaire measuring infants’ general curiosity across a target age range of 5 to 24 months. Rather than constraining behavioral expressions of curiosity to a specific theoretical framework, we instead adopt a broad definition of infant curiosity as a keen desire or tendency to actively explore one’s immediate surroundings. We developed 36 items reflecting various behaviors and developing skills with which infants can actively explore and interact with their environment from birth onwards. Caregivers are asked to evaluate how well each item reflects their child’s typical behavior on a Likert-scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree) with an option of ‘not applicable (NA)’ for behaviours the child does not display (perhaps because they are too young). An item applicable for younger infants is for instance “When my child encounters an object, they are likely to put it in their mouth for further inspection (e.g., to see what it feels or tastes like).” Other items referring to skills such as interacting socially (e.g., “When reading a picture book together, my child directs me (e.g., by pointing) towards what they want to know more about.”) may only become applicable later on. The survey was piloted on N = 22 participants of a constrained age group (Mage = 11.53, 41% f

Infants explore the world to learn about it based on their intrinsically motivated curiosity. However, the mechanisms underlying such exploratory behavior are largely unknown. We propose a new theory in which active learners explore randomly until encountering a familiar entity (e.g. a second stimulus from a previously encountered category) because here, learning is suddenly maximized. Such a category will then be exploited as long as the learning progress is above an individually varying ‘boredom threshold’; Above this threshold, learning is rewarding – positively reinforcing exploitation. Below this threshold, the learning progress is too small to be rewarding, and they will return to random exploration. The threshold itself can be lowered through inhibition, allowing sustained attention despite smaller learning progress. Here, we will first test this theory in a gaze-contingent eye-tracking task: 10-month-old infants will be introduced to two novel stimulus categories with 30 exemplars each (Fribbles, TarrLab). Two identical “houses” will be presented on a computer screen, and a new exemplar from either category will be revealed when the infant fixates on the corresponding house. This design will enable us to distinguish between exploration – switching from one category to the other – and exploitation – consecutively triggering exemplars from the same category. In follow-on studies we will test older children as well as adults, who will be able to trigger exemplar presentations via key presses. Across age groups, we will measure the number, speed, and sequence of trigger-events, as well as the switches between categories. We hypothesize that if a category was triggered twice it is more likely to be triggered again; the first two triggers establish familiarity and allow for learning which will be rewarding, reinforcing further exploitation. While the length of ‘exploitation-runs’ may differ between participants (representing varying boredom thresholds), constant s

Infants explore the world to learn about it based on their intrinsically motivated curiosity. However, the mechanisms underlying such exploratory behaviour are largely unknown. Here, we will address this question by investigating infants’ choices of exploring diverse information vs. exploiting more familiar information in a gaze-contingent eye-tracking task. In our initial study, 10-month-old infants will be introduced to two novel stimulus categories with 30 exemplars each (Fribbles, TarrLab). Two identical “houses” will be presented on a computer screen, and a new exemplar from either category will be revealed when the infant fixates on the corresponding house. This design will enable us to distinguish between exploration – switching from one category to the other – and exploitation – consecutively triggering exemplars from the same category. In follow-on studies, we will test older children as well as adults, who will be able to trigger exemplar presentations via key presses. Across age groups, we will measure the number, speed, and sequence of trigger-events, as well as the switches between categories. Thereby, we will investigate to what extent exploratory behaviour is comparable across participants and if there are systematic individual differences between weighing exploration against exploitation. As the outcome of this research, we expect to better understand the developmental trajectory of curious, active exploration including possible individual differences. Additionally, we plan to explore whether such characteristics are stable over time and whether they relate to other measures of personality and cognitive development. In conclusion, we aim to build a comprehensive new body of research crucially integrating a universal perspective on infant curiosity with a focus on individual differences (PerezEdgar et al., 2020).

Numerous studies have used object familiarity as an independent variable without ever actually defining the construct. Instead, it has been used as a measure of exposure - more exposure of a stimulus making it more familiar. Yet, we argue, that being familiar with an object is more than simple exposure: different levels of experience with and knowledge about an object should be integrated into the construct. Thus, we created the Developmental Object Familiarity Inventory (DOFI) as a new parent report measure to evaluate object familiarity on a six-point scale. The scale points are: (1)"My child has never seen this object before", (2)"My child has paid attention to this object before", (3)"My child has shown interest to explore the object at least once", (4)"My child has some knowledge about the object's use", (5)"My child can indicate where the object is when asked for it", and (6)"My child has and uses a consistent word for the object". This way, real-life familiarity about real-life objects can be measured, as well as, other research questions related to object familiarity (e.g., van Renswoude et al., 2019). Items were 76 objects covering six object categories following the CDI's organization (Fenson et al., 1993): 'vehicles' (9 items), 'toys' (9 items), 'food' (11 items), 'clothing' (14 items), 'household' (18 items), and 'furniture' (15 items) based on the Dutch CDI (N-CDI; Zink & Lejaeger, 2002). In three studies the new measure's reliability and validity was investigated by collecting data about infants between the age of 6 and 24 months. A first study (N = 10 infant reports, M = 15,37; SD = 3,98) shows that the six scale points indeed follow a strict order for all parents for all items. A second study (N = 28 complete infant reports, M = 13,5; SD = 5,5) was aimed at testing the internal structure of the questionnaire (Messick, 1995; Downing, 2003). The survey had great internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha is .991) and a good interitem correlation (d = .63).

Genetic sequences are known to possess non-trivial composition together with symmetries in the frequencies of their components. Recently, it has been shown that symmetry and structure are hierarchically intertwined in DNA, suggesting a common origin for both features. However, the mechanism leading to this relationship is unknown. Here we investigate a biologically motivated dynamics for the evolution of genetic sequences. We show that a metastable (long-lived) regime emerges in which sequences have symmetry and structure interlaced in a way that matches that of extant genomes.

Biologists have long sought a way to explain how statistical properties of genetic sequences emerged and are maintained through evolution. On the one hand, non-random structures at different scales indicate a complex genome organisation. On the other hand, single-strand symmetry has been scrutinised using neutral models in which correlations are not considered or irrelevant, contrary to empirical evidence. Different studies investigated these two statistical features separately, reaching minimal consensus despite sustained efforts. Here we unravel previously unknown symmetries in genetic sequences, which are organized hierarchically through scales in which non-random structures are known to be present. These observations are confirmed through the statistical analysis of the human genome and explained through a simple domain model. These results suggest that domain models which account for the cumulative action of mobile elements can explain simultaneously non-random structures and symmetries in genetic sequences

This document is primarily speaking to those academics who have some say over the employment, management and support of contingent academic staff (even if such responsibilities are not formally recognised by their institutions). However, we are not suggesting that this is an ‘us and them’ issue, nor should our approach be interpreted as an oppositional understanding of different institutional positions. The strength and vibrancy of sociology as a discipline is dependent on a common interest and commitment to advocating for and building sustainable academic practice.

We consider networks in which random walkers are removed because of the failure of specific nodes. We interpret the rate of loss as a measure of the importance of nodes, a notion we denote as failure centrality. We show that the degree of the node is not sufficient to determine this measure and that, in a first approximation, the shortest loops through the node have to be taken into account. We propose approximations of the failure centrality which are valid for temporal-varying failures, and we dwell on the possibility of externally changing the relative importance of nodes in a given network by exploiting the interference between the loops of a node and the cycles of the temporal pattern of failures. In the limit of long failure cycles we show analytically that the escape in a node is larger than the one estimated from a stochastic failure with the same failure probability. We test our general formalism in two real-world networks (air-transportation and e-mail users) and show how communities lead to deviations from predictions for failures in hubs.