Dr. Karasik and her research team is interested in how culture and childrearing practices shape infants' learning opportunities thereby affecting developmental outcomes. How does culture affect which skills infants acquire and when? How do cultural practices shape opportunities for infants to practice crawling, walking, and using cultural artifacts and objects? Through naturalistic and experimental investigations, we examine how infants' emerging motor skills offer new ways to explore and navigate their environment, engage with people, and use social information from others. We examine how caregivers update their expectations and behaviors as a result of their infants' changing skills. To answer these questions, we conduct studies in the lab and in the field; in the U.S. and abroad to capture the range of infants' experiences and individual differences. Dr. Karasik directs the Culture & Development Lab located in 4S; visit www.karasiklab.org to learn more.
Degrees
PhD, New York University
BA, University of Michigan
Selected Publications:
Karasik, L. B., Tamis-LeMonda, C. S., & Adolph, K. E. (2016). Decisions at the brink: Locomotor experience affects infants' use of social information on an adjustable drop-off. Frontiers in Psychology.
Karasik, L. B., Tamis-LeMonda, C. S., Adolph, K. E., & Bornstein, M. H. (2015). Places and postures: A cross-cultural comparison of sitting in 5-month-olds infants. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 46, 1023-1038.
Karasik, L. B., Tamis-LeMonda, C. S., & Adolph, K. E. (2014). Crawlers and walkers elicit different verbal responses from mothers. Developmental Science, 17, 388-395.
Karasik, L. B., Tamis-LeMonda, C. S., & Adolph, K. E. (2011). Transition from crawling to walking and infants’ actions with objects and people. Child Development, 82, 1199-1209.
Karasik, L. B., Adolph, K. E., Tamis-LeMonda, & C. S., Bornstein, M. H. (2010). WEIRD walking: Cross-cultural research on motor development. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 33, 95.
Adolph, K. E., Karasik, L. B., & Tamis-LeMonda, C. S. (2010). Motor skills. In Bornstein, M. H. (Ed.), Handbook of Cultural Developmental Science (pp. 61-88). New York, NY: Taylor & Francis.
