Give your baby time to look for and find the hidden toy, bottle or even another person.
Playing "Hide and Seek" or games that involve hiding objects helps children to develop their memory. Child-initiated play within a safe boundary allows them to move at their own pace, try out new ideas and feel unrestrained by adults' rules. This experience helps children develop their own identity and learn to navigate the world independently.
In children under two, hiding things and finding them again reinforces the concept of "object permanence". This refers to the understanding that objects continue to exist even if they are unseen. When playing games that involve hiding toys for others or themselves to find, children exercise their short-term (working) memory and processing speed. Such games also develop visual-spatial abilities as they need to look and make comparisons to assess if something can be fully hidden, and categorize things in which items can and cannot be hidden. All these skills lay the foundation for building the cognitive abilities of young children. Pelphrey, KA.; Reznick, JS. Working memory in infancy. In: Kail, RV., editor. Advances in child development and behaviour. Vol. Vol. 31. San Diego, CA: Academic Press; 2003. p. 173-227. Haden, C. A., Ornstein, P. A., O'Brien, B. S., Elischberger, H. B., Tyler, C. S., & Burchinal, M. J. (2011). The development of children's early memory skills. Journal of experimental child psychology, 108(1), 44–60.
Read more at CD-MEM-C03.