I'm writing this on the Sunday morning of Labor Day weekend, 2009. Paulina is just shy of three months old. But this entry starts with a story about me:
I went to graduate school at the University of California. My first act as a graduate student was to be oriented. This meant learning my way around campus, picking up an ID card and email address, and meeting with my advisor to discuss classes and research. The meeting took place on the Friday before Labor Day weekend, 1995.
Deciding classes was easy (statistics, the required first-year "bonding" class, a seminar in cognitive science, and a research credit - all required). The majority of the meeting was about research. I came to Berkeley from a small liberal arts college. I had performed research in computer science, and had run some experiments on adults, but my graduate advisor was a developmental psychologist, and the expectation was that I would now run experiments on children and study cognitive development. Although I spent a year in college volunteering in a kindergarten classroom, I had no real experience thinking about how children developed, or what contribution I would be expected to make. I also had never studied development, having spent my college career studying artificial intelligence and adult (and some non-human animal) cognition.
In response to my concerns, my advisor handed me a thick stack of pages, held together by two rubber bands. "This is a draft of my book," she told me. "I'm still working on it with my co-author, but it's a good starting point. Read this, and we'll meet next week."
The book was called Words, thoughts, and theories. My advisor was Alison Gopnik.
I read the manuscript over the long weekend (we had scheduled a meeting for first thing Tuesday morning, and I was tasked in that meeting for coming up with ideas for a project). I was hooked. That was when I knew I wanted to figure out how children understood the world and develop that knowledge. I'm still asking research questions based on that first reading. I'm sure that during that Tuesday meeting I rattled off several incoherent ideas, but they led the way to what's now been a 14+ year research career. (I even feel like I've answered some of those questions, so that's a start).
I was reminded of this story by two events this past week. The first was the orientation meeting I had last Friday with a new graduate student who has come to work in my lab. We talked about classes, which was easy, and about research, which was more in depth. We're meeting again on Tuesday, and I'll see what ideas she comes up with. But the second was a package I received from Alison the day before, which I had only opened that morning. It contained a copy of her new book, The Philosophical Baby, which I read over the weekend (with the help of some long naps taken by Paulina).
The book represents scientific writing at its best - warm and accessible while at the same time deep and thought-provoking. I'm obviously a fan (if you haven't figured out by now, I borrowed liberally from Alison's last book with Andy Meltzoff and Pat Kuhl, The Scientist in the Crib to title this blog). As someone who studied with Alison for six years, my insider contribution is that, yes, she really does love Christmas (you have to read to the end to get the reference - I'll just say that for the lab Christmas party, she would make a Bûche de Noël, which would sit on the table for most of the night admired by her graduate students as a work of art. Eventually, on her insistence, one of us would cut into it - usually the most senior student).
I won't do a thorough review of the book here. I can't be unbiased. I'm sure, though, that I'll mention some of the ideas in future entries. I will only say now that I highly recommend it as an introduction to why the study of development is important for every student of psychology, but more importantly, anyone with the aspiration to be a parent or the awareness that they were once a child.
That said, the short section on awe at the end of the book resonated with me much in the same way that I was struck by the ideas I was introduced to 14 years ago. Gopnik suggests that most scientists share the belief that there is a profound significance of their work - discovery for its own sake expands our human potential because it reminds us that universal truths are large and inspiring. Her point is that this is true for children as well - watch a 4-year-old's reaction to a magic show and you see looks of awe. I've see in it Paulina's eyes as she looks intently at her hand, only to bring it to her mouth and suck. I've found something to put in my mouth that doesn't rely on one of these big creatures who are like me to stick something in there! (Incidentally, she's done this with her toes too, but at just shy of 3 months, she doesn't yet have the coordination to bring her toes to her mouth. It'll come. There are other rewards besides discovery).
More generally, what I'm left with is that the task my daughter faces is awesome - to learn about the world. As she wakes up from her nap now (which indicates the end of this entry), I'm reminded that the road of any learner - whether mid-career professor, new graduate student, or new baby - is full of wonder. But we're also guided along the way. My hope is to guide my daughter the best I can.
