Effect of Varying and Nonvarying Stimulus Consequences on Visual Persistence in Twenty-Month-Old Infants

40 Ss, divided into 4 groups, peered into a chamber and by so doing, exposed a slide. For half the Ss, continued peering regularly presented a new slide which consisted either of colorful pictures (varied-picture group) or a lighted screen of various brightness levels (varied-light group) while for the other half, continued peering always re-presented the same slide which consisted either of a colorful picture (constant-picture group) or a lighted screen (constant-light group). The varied-picture group relative to the other groups exposed the most slides and tended to take a single long look when a slide was exposed. In terms of this visual persistence pattern, the constant-picture group outperformed the remaining two groups. No significant differences were found between the constant-light and varied-light groups on any measure of persistence.