What question did this study set out to answer?

The study aims to understand whether infants respond to expectation violations in physical and social contexts through distinct or shared mechanisms.

Infants’ Domain‐General Responses to Expectancy Violations

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Randomized trial examines infants' expectancy violations in physical and social domains, suggesting a general mechanism of prediction error.

The study aims to understand whether infants respond to expectation violations in physical and social contexts through distinct or shared mechanisms.
Examined 14- to 27-month-old infants' responses to 16 events involving physics and social behavior.
Compared visual interests in expected versus surprising outcomes.
Analyzed the data to determine if responses were better explained by a single latent factor.
Infants showed greater visual interest in surprising events than expected, indicating a shared response to violations.
The single latent factor model explained infants' responses across both domains more effectively than separate models.
Infants' surprise varied across domains and was linked to later curiosity, suggesting early predictors of exploration.

Bisbee et al. (2026) studied this question.

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Randomized trial examines infants' expectancy violations in physical and social domains, suggesting a general mechanism of prediction error.