Autism - A Theory of Mind (COGNITIVE EXPL.)

Question 1

What is theory of mind?

Answer 1

A cognitive skill which is a person’s ability to understand other people’s mental states and to see the world from the perspective of other people.

Question 2

What happens when a child has theory of mind?

Answer 2

They recognise that each person they meet has their own set of beliefs, emotions, likes and dislikes that may be different from their own.

Question 3

When does theory of mind develop?

Answer 3

In early life, around 5 months of age where you begin to recognise facial expressions

Question 4

When do children begin to use non verbal information to guide their behaviour?

Answer 4

When they can reliably interpret the facial expressions of others

Question 5

When do children without autism, even with learning difficulties, fully develop a theory of mind?

Answer 5

Age 4

Question 6

What did Baron Cohen believe about autistic children?

Answer 6

That they lacked theory of mind and demonstrated mind blindness - the inability to read others’ intentions

Question 7

Why did Baron Cohen believe that autistic children displayed mind blindness?

Answer 7

Because they do not use the eye direction of others to guide their behaviour as they fail to consider the mental state of others, explains lack of social skills

Question 8

Who took part in the Sally-Anne experiment?

Answer 8

A group of autistic children, children with down’s syndrome and some with no disability

Question 9

What did the researchers do with the Sally-Anne dolls?

Answer 9

They manipulated the two dolls in a pretend situation while the child watched

Question 10

What is the first step of the SA experiment?

Answer 10

The researcher explains that Sally has a basket and Anne has a box

Question 11

What is the second step of the SA experiment?

Answer 11

Sally puts a marble in the basket and then leaves the scene

Question 12

What is the third step of the SA experiment?

Answer 12

Anne moves the marble from the basket into the box

Question 13

Sally then returns for the fourth stage and the child is asked a belief question which is…

Answer 13

‘Where will sally look for her marble?’

Question 14

How do children pass the test?

Answer 14

They say Sally will look in the basket

Question 15

How do children fail the test?

Answer 15

They say Sally will look in the box as they know the marble is in the box, they don’t understand that Sally doesn’t know this

Question 16

What did the findings show in the SA test?

Answer 16

That only autistic children didn’t have theory of mind as they weren’t able to understand that Sally didn’t know what they knew

Question 17

What does it mean if you are low empathising?

Answer 17

It means you do not have a good understanding of the emotions and feelings of others

Question 18

What does it mean if you are high systemising?

Answer 18

It means you have the ability to use internal rules to organise, plan and build structures and to work out patterns

Question 19

What are autistic people in terms of empathisers and systemisers?

Answer 19

High systemisers and low empathisers

Question 20

What is an issue with the research supporting theory of mind?

Answer 20

It is typically focussed on preschool children because this is when it develops, this limits the generalisability as there is little known about TOM in older children

Question 21

What is an issue with cause and effect?

Answer 21

It may be that an absence of theory of mind is a characteristic rather than the cause of autism, it could be that due to autism, TOM doesn’t develop

Question 22

What does TOM fail to explain?

Answer 22

All the difficulties faced by the autistic: e.g verbalisation of words as it does not require empathy, or why they can’t use eye contact or use non verbal communication

Question 23

What weakness does Pellicano (2010) offer who looked at 37 children with high functioning ASD?

Answer 23

He found that HF ASD doesn’t correspond with TOM as they found executive functioning predicted how well chidren did with false belief tasks rather than TOM

Question 24

What is an issue with the Sally Anne task?

Answer 24

Children might not understand what they were supposed to do in the study

Question 25

Why does Hutchins (2012) argue that the theory of mind inventory test is better than the sally/anne test?

Answer 25

Because it had more test retest reliability and he included children up to the age of 17 so it is more generalisable, also provides a score rather than a pass or fail

Question 26

What did Hutchins et al (2012) find in his theory of mind inventory test?

Answer 26

Ages 4-5; 5.97 ASD
Ages 4-5; 14.61 Typical
Shows a significant difference in TOM

Question 27

How does Hutchins et al (2012) show how TOM develops?

Answer 27

He found at age 6 they got 8.80 which is higher than 5.97

Question 28

What did Sheeran et al (2013) conclude?

Answer 28

That school age children and adolescents with ASD can do mind state reasoning, found that the severity of autism did not link to how well tasks were done

Question 29

What is a strength of the sally anne study (Baron-Cohen et al 1985)?

Answer 29

They used autistic children, typical children and downs syndrome children which means they had different groups to compare the children with autism to