The Rouge
The Rouge test is a tool used to evaluate an individual's understanding of Self by recognizing their own reflection in a mirror. Two separate studies were conducted by Amsterdam and Gallup, who independently developed the same technique. Amsterdam focused on infants, as discussed in their 1968 doctoral dissertation, first published in 1972. Meanwhile, Gallup explored the test with chimpanzees and monkeys in 1970, as mentioned in the works of Gallup, McClure, Hill, and Bundy (1971). In both cases, the researchers sought a non-verbal assessment method.
The Rouge Test consists of three phases:
- First, the child's spontaneous behavior in front of a mirror is observed. The child must look at him/herself in the mirror at least once before moving on to the next phase.
- In the rouge phase, an experimenter or mother
...secretly applies a rouge (or blue) mark on the child's cheek near the nose, out of the child's sight.
- Next, the children's reactions to their altered mirror images with the rouge mark are observed.
All children are observed for the same minimum period of time to determine if they show any signs of attention to the rouge mark. These signs would indicate self-recognition according to Amsterdam (1972) and Gallup (1970). According to Amsterdam (1972), children between six and twelve months old perceive their reflections as a "sociable playmate." They begin to admire themselves and exhibit embarrassment from twelve months onward. By age two, their self-recognition reaches around 65%. In general, children pass the Rouge Test at over 18 months old.
At the age of two, children begin to develop self-awareness and become more self-conscious. They start evaluating thei
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behavior and appearance based on their own standards as well as others' (Asendorph, J. 1993). According to Bertenthal and Fischer (1978) and Lewis and Brooks-Gunn (1979), self-development in 2-year-olds indicates the growth of self-awareness prior to using verbal labels for themselves. It has been observed that individuals and animals, upon gaining vision after being blind from birth, initially perceive their mirror image as a separate entity (John, A. 992). Even animals, including great apes like humans, have been seen to pass tests of self-recognition, although this ability develops after 18 months (Archer, J.).
In the year 1992, Amsterdam conducted a study on mirror self-recognition in several animal species, including Rhesus macaques (Gallup, G. G. 1970), Dolphins (Reiss, D. 1992), Elephants (Plotnik, J. M. et al. 2006), Bonobos (Miller, J. 2009), and Chimpanzees (Miller, J. 2009). However, most animals initially displayed hostile reactions towards their mirror images. Since then, numerous replications of Amsterdam's findings with infants have taken place. This small-scale study aims to partially replicate those findings by classifying children into pass or fail categories based on rouge-related behaviors. The main objective of this study is to assess the effectiveness and consistency of the coding scheme and measures employed.
METHOD CHECKLIST PARTICIPANTS (describe here the sample you have analysed)
The sample that was analyzed for this study included five participants, consisting of four babies (two males and two females) aged between 9 months and 18 months. Rusty, a male chimpanzee, also participated.
PROCEDURE (tick the correct option/s)
The study utilized either naturalistic observation or structured observation. Specification regarding whether it was conducted in a laboratory or field setting was
not provided.
field;direct vs.ideotape): The test was conducted in a field setting. The participants' responses were recorded on videotape by a friend or family member and observed by their mother.
CODING (tick the correct option/s)
The coding scheme used for this test was based on momentary events, duration events, physically based codes, socially based codes, mutually exclusive codes, non-mutually exclusive codes, and exhaustive coding. The specific coding scheme for each category is as follows:
CRITERION CATEGORIES (necessary to pass the Rouge Test)
Code 26: Baby turns head to look at the Rouge mark in the mirror without touching it.
Code 27: Baby shows Rouge mark to mother or experimenter.
Code 28: Baby touches Rouge mark with finger while looking at it in the mirror.
Code 29: Baby touches other cheek (not cheek with Rouge mark) with fingers while looking at it in the mirror. This indicates poor knowledge of reflecting properties of mirrors, not of one's image.
Code 30: Baby touches Rouge mark with toy, tissue, or anything else (not fingers) while looking at it in the mirror.
OTHER CATEGORIES
Since all criterion categories were measuring the same ability, an overall comparison between observers was conducted based on the total numbers of criterion events detected by each observer for each participant (refer to Table 2).The coding provided by SR serves as the second observer, but you can use data from another student instead. If you choose to do so, please specify the student N and replace the values provided by SR with his/hers. The comparison between the two observers focused on the onset time of behavior. Yes1?No1.
DISCUSSION
To elaborate on the topic, the
results obtained from the participants validate previous studies, indicating that babies below 18 months of age are unable to recognize themselves in the mirror. Instead, they perceive their mirror images as another "playmate." In contrast, children around 18 months or slightly older are able to recognize themselves and acknowledge any unusual marks on their faces, trying to remove them (Amsterdam, B. 1972).
Although the study's results supported previous findings, the inter-observer agreement was not consistent. Specifically, the agreement was only 47%, which was low due to slight differences in coding between the novice observer and the original observer. The coding scheme was overly detailed, leading to confusion and difficulty for both observers to accurately record separate codes in their respective columns. Despite this, the novice observer exhibited more thorough coding in certain parts of the videos, identifying codes that the original observer did not observe or record. Conversely, in other parts of the videos, the original observer noted more codes than the novice observer. Additionally, some codes within the coding scheme were not observed by either observer while viewing the babies' performances. Therefore, not all behaviors related to rouge worked for either observer or the novice observer.
The codes provided were detailed and easy to understand and use, but some of them may have been unnecessary. For example, the code BTRO (Baby Touches Rouge with Object) didn't make sense to observers. The baby either showed no interest in their mirror image or focused on touching the rouge mark with their fingers as if it were an object. Similarly, the code BTOC (Baby Touches Own Cheek) was seen as unnecessary because babies couldn't comprehend reflection. Removing these codes
wouldn't have affected the overall results of the rouge test. Being a novice observer, whether a student or one of the given observers, didn't cause any issues. Both experienced and novice observers took the same amount of time to observe and record babies' behaviors towards the rouge marks on their faces.
