IKidsCentre: University of Toronto Scarborough

Meet Anny Zhou Wu, a research assistant at the TEMPO lab! 🎶

She enjoys trying foods from different cultures. At any chance she gets, she would travel and explore new food—this is why she went to Germany to study abroad for a summer! ✈️🇩🇪 Her research interest lies in parent-child relationships and how music influences children’s development, especially how they learn and interact through listening to music and play. 🎧🧸👧🏼🧒🏾

🌲To learn more about our labs and our members, check the linktree in our bio

🔗Interested in signing up for research? Check the link in our bio for more

☺️Happy Monday, everyone!

Meet Ana Luiza Miranda Guimaraes! She is a PhD student at the TEMPO lab 🎶

During her free time, she loves to dance Jazzfunk and Dancehall 💃 When she’s not on the dance floor, she likes to play volleyball 🏐! When she’s is at the TEMPO lab, she studies how children’s connections to different social partners (i.e., peers and siblings) affects the development of their coordination skills in music and speech 🎶💬!

🌲To learn more about our labs and our members, check the linktree in our bio

🔗Interested in signing up for research? Check the link in our bio for more

☺️Happy Monday, everyone!

Everyone, meet Ayanika Bhattacharjee, a third-year student pursing a specialist in Mental Health Studies🧠 🏥! She helps out with the Laboratory for Infant Studies as a Research Assistant 👩‍🏫

She’s especially interested in research on how infants connect what they move when navigating the world around them…
…It’s all about how little minds make big moves!

Guess how many languages Ayanika speaks... Swipe to find out!

[reposted]

Everyone, meet Ayanika Bhattacharjee, a third-year student pursing a specialist in Mental Health Studies 🧠🏥

She’s especially interested in research on how infants connect what they move when navigating the world around them 👁️🚶🧐
It’s all about how little minds make big moves!

Guess how many languages Ayanika speaks…Swipe to find out!

Does your little one have the groove? 🕺🪩

New research shows that children as young as three years old are sensitive to “musical groove,” a specific quality of music that makes adults want to move! In a study where kids (junior scientists) danced freely in their own homes, developmental science researchers found that the right playlist makes a huge difference: more dance time, better timing, and a joy factor where the music encouraged them ot dance!

Using high-groove music is not just useful for a dance party, it can serve as a powerful tool for early auditory-motor development 🎶🧠! It helps children develop coordination, rhythm, and social bonds through shared movement.

Next time you need to get the wiggles out, reach for those high groove tracks! 👟💃

Meet Meyha Chhatwal, a PhD student at the TEMPO lab! 🎶

A fun fact about Meyha, is that she is a classically trained vocalist! 🎤

As for her research interest, she likes to study the intersection of cognitive science 🧠, music 🎵, and babies 👶! She is interested in how musical and non-musical experiences shape language 💬 and social emotional development during the earliest years of life.

🌲To learn more about our labs and our members, check the linktree in our bio

🔗Interested in signing up for research? Check the link in our bio for more

☺️Happy Monday, everyone!

Live music hits different… Even for babies! 👶

Did you know? 🤔

Infants show longer attention and stronger emotional connection during live performances vs. recordings? Research shows infants are more attentive and even heart rate may synchronize during live music, highlighting the power of shared, real-time experiences.

Get ready Junior Scientists! We’ll be tabling at the !!! 🦒

🤩 We will have super fun activities for children of all ages!
💬We will be able to answer questions families have regarding iKids.
🗓️ Tuesday, Mar 17 & Thursday, Mar 18 from 10 AM to - 3 PM.
📍Special Events Centre, located in the Discovery Zone.

🌲To learn more about iKids Centre, check the linktree in our bio.
🔗Interested in signing up for research? Check the link in our bio for more!

Meet Amanda Algeria from the Laboratory for Infant Studies lab!

Amanda is specializing in Mental Health 🧠🏥 and is currently a 4th year undergraduate student. She interested in researching the ways in which early locomotive movements (rolling, crawling, scooting, or early walking) 🚶 can predict/explain future motor skills (coordination, balance, running, jumping, fine motor skills like writing and using tools) 🏃✍️.

🌲To learn more about our labs and our members, check the linktree in our bio

🔗Interested in signing up for research? Check the link in our bio for more

☺️Happy Monday, everyone!

Imagine a child sees their mother receive a gift. 🎁👩

The mother smiles and acts happy in front of the gift-giver, but when the gift-giver turns away, her face looks disappointed. This research shows that school-aged children are smart enough to realize:

1. The mother is “masking” her true feelings to be polite (using a social display rule).
2. Even though the gift-giver didn’t say anything, they must have wanted the mother to like the gift.

🎭Even when someone is “masking” their true feelings to be polite, like smiling after a disappointing loss, children are astute enough to use those social cues to recover the mental states of the intended audience. This “inverse inference” is a major milestone that helps kids navigate complex peer dynamics and understand the “unspoken” rules of social life.

👫While we often try to hide our feelings to protect others, this research suggests there is a limit to how much we can truly hide! Our efforts to be polite actually reveal a lot about our understanding of the people around us.