When you look at a baby, a multitude of thoughts might cross your mind, ranging from “aww cute” to “ew, I’m never having kids”. You might see a baby babbling, screaming, drooling, or giving you that heedless, unwavering stare, and think about how silly that baby is. How socially inept! There’s not a thought behind those eyes! But what if I told you that every single baby is actually a young scientist? That everyday, babies are conducting social and scientific experiments; testing the limits of their understanding and noting down the mechanics of our world? Together, let’s explore how everyday babies are deploying the scientific method to learn about the world around them, and how they use these techniques to navigate life.
If you’re at all familiar with this magazine, you’ll most likely know exactly what the scientific method entails. For those of you who haven’t touched a science kit since your Year 9 biology class, I’ll briefly explain. The scientific method (also known as the analytical method) is the use of a series of experiments to test a hypothesis. These experiments are often circular in their function, with the hypothesis modified and further retested until consistent results are achieved (1). It is standard practice within the many fields of science, and can range from wildly entertaining social experiments, to closely controlled quantitative observations. In the most basic terms, the scientific method is the art of asking a question, then seeking an answer.
Picture a baby in a highchair. They’re happily wobbling their arms and swinging their plump little legs. Maybe they are even dribbling out the remnants of their mushy lunches. They pick up their spoon, and instead of using the spoon for its intended purpose, they drop it onto the floor.
There are a number of things happening in this given scenario. A baby isn’t simply dropping the spoon to be annoying or to make itself laugh; though many babies have in the past, and will in the future, think that this act is very, very funny. The baby is asking a question – creating a hypothesis – and testing a number of variables. What happens when I let go of this spoon? When they drop the spoon, they are observing science in action. Gravity – the spoon falls down. Physics – the spoon spins in the air and bounces on the floor. The energy of sound waves – the clattering of the spoon on tile is loud, versus the soft boff of it bouncing on carpet. There are also the social aspects to consider. How will the people around them react? Will they come pick up the spoon? Is this a good way to get somebody’s attention? Like all great scientists, a baby will need to run multiple tests to come to conclusive results, so they will drop a lot of spoons.
Now, am I advocating for us to let children throw their spoons around? Of course not. Part of this experience is for children to also learn that throwing spoons at the dinner table isn’t classified as decent behaviour in our society. But I do believe that it is important to acknowledge what a child is doing here. This action stems from curiosity, and it is important to cultivate that curiosity rather than quash it.
Curiosity is a common trait we associate with ourselves as a species, and more often than not, is an intrinsic characteristic of children. Ironically enough, science has a hard time pinpointing the ‘why’ behind our curiosity (2), though many theories on the cognitive development of humans link our need to observe the environment and animal behaviour to survival (3). The power of curiosity is a baby’s best tool in their metaphorical toolkit. As a newly conscious being, there’s a lot about the world that they simply don’t understand. There’s a reason why the phrase, “a baby’s brain is like a sponge”, is so well known. They absorb everything, and are constantly using any newly acquired knowledge to test the limits of their own understanding.
The art of observing the world and the willingness to learn from it can be broken down into four main categories: questioning (the act of verbalising curiosity), physical exploration (bodily curiosity as a sensory experience), philosophising (the act of verbalising wonder) and embodied fascination (bodily wonder that does not seek a cognitive answer) (4). Of course, a baby won’t start verbalising their curiosity until they can speak (at which point you might be forced into the repetitive hell of a child’s never-ending echolalia of “but why?”), but instinctually the questions are present.
These four categories are not mutually exclusive; often wonder can lead to curiosity and curiosity can lead to wonder. When people are given the room to explore their curiosity in any learning institution, they naturally grasp the concepts taught to them with a better understanding (5). Unfortunately, many modern day schools prioritise academic performance over a child’s own understanding of any given topic. I’m sure we can all relate to being talked at by a lecturer in the classroom rather than being invited to participate in the conversation. It’s a pretty fast way to get your brain to switch off and dull any curious inclination you might have had. It is no secret that some children learn differently from others, and this method of simply giving instruction in class can work for some. But using the broadest methods of engaging in wonder and curiosity will help all students, alongside their relationship with learning as a whole (6). Have you ever wondered why children enjoy field trips so much? It isn’t just the novelty of breaking a set routine and ‘skipping’ a school day; it’s also much simpler than that. Field trips give students a safe space to have fun with their learning and actively immerses them in all four categories of wonder and curiosity.
Let’s take the example of students going to a planetarium. A child has the opportunity to physically explore a space; by interacting with planet mobiles or using their hands to feel textures on touchable exhibits, children are engaging in their bodily curiosity. Questions are naturally prompted by these physical explorations – “Is this Mars?”, “Which planet is Earth?” – which can lead to further discussions with their teachers and peers. Through these discussions, children can start philosophising certain ideas based on their newly acquired knowledge: “These space rocks look like rocks on Earth. I wonder if they are made of the same thing?”. And in the quieter moments, children can idly sit with their own embodied fascination, taking in the atmosphere of the universe from inside the cool dome of the planetarium. There are no examinations or grading on field trips. A child has the freedom to simply be.
This cultivation of curiosity at such a young age actively helps aid in the development of more complex and abstract thoughts (7) and leads to children in learning institutions taking more intellectual risks when approaching topics unknown to them. There’s a magic in being curious, in this need to fill in the blanks of their own knowledge. When children are comfortable in their own lack of understanding, they are not only more receptive to learning, but are shown to be more flexible in their beliefs when presented with new ideas (8). They engage more in classrooms, they speak up when they don’t understand, and they embrace the discomfort of not knowing.
It all starts with the little, nappy-wearing scientist, sitting in their highchair. These babies are setting up their own cognitive learning systems from the moment they open their eyes. They let their curiosity guide their experimentation, which shapes how they come to understand the world. So what if they’re not making any groundbreaking revelations? They don’t need to be. Give in to your own curiosity next time you encounter a baby in the wild. See if you can observe the little scientist in action as they interact with the world for the first time. And hell, maybe let them drop a few spoons.
References
Gregersen E. Scientific method. Britannica. 24 April 2026. https://www.britannica.com/topic/empirical-evidence
Kobayashi K, Ravaioli S, Baranès A, et al. Diverse motives for human curiosity. Nature Human Behaviour. 2019;3:587-595. doi:10.1038/s41562-019-0589-3
Del Claro K. It All Began Out of Necessity and Curiosity. Behavioral Ecology. 2026;1-10. doi:10.1007/978-3-032-13988-7_1
Heggen MP, Lynngård AM. Wonder and curiosity beyond the obvious—a dynamic model of bodily and verbal understandings of these phenomena. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications. 2026;13:167. doi:10.1057/s41599-025-06467-3
Kidd C, Hayden B. The Psychology and Neuroscience of Curiosity.” Neuron. 2015;88(3):449-460. doi:10.1016/j.neuron.2015.09.010
Peterson EM. Supporting curiosity in schools and classrooms. Behavioral Sciences. 2020;35:7-13. doi:10.1016/j.cobeha.2020.05.006
Hall S. The Young Child as Scientist. A Learning Moments Collection. Videatives. 2015. https://videatives.com/node/2117
Jirout JJ, Vitiello VE, Zumbrunn SK. Curiosity In Schools. The New Science of Curiosity. Edited by Gordon G., 243-266. Nova, 2018.
