What term means understanding that an object still exists when hidden?

What term means understanding that an object still exists when hidden? Object permanence.

Object permanence means understanding that an object continues to exist even when it cannot be seen, heard, or otherwise directly sensed. A baby who searches for a toy hidden beneath a blanket is showing behavior associated with this concept.

The idea became central to Jean Piaget’s theory of cognitive development. Piaget placed object permanence within the sensorimotor period, which lasts from birth to about age two. In his account, infants gradually progress from tracking visible objects to retrieving partially hidden objects and eventually reasoning about objects moved completely out of sight.

Piaget’s classic observations included the A-not-B error: after repeatedly finding a toy in location A, an infant may continue reaching there even after watching it move to location B. Later research has challenged the idea that object permanence appears only as late as Piaget proposed. Looking-time and violation-of-expectation studies suggest that younger infants may represent hidden objects earlier, although performance depends on memory, motor ability, and the task used.

Object permanence is not the same as object constancy, which usually concerns maintaining an emotional or perceptual representation of a person or object despite changes in appearance or context.