Comp 7 Flashcards
What is human social cognition
Humans are outstanding in their social cognitive abilities It is a sub-topic of social psychology that focuses on how people process, store, and apply information about other people and social situations. It focuses on the role that cognitive processes play in our future interactions. Humans can make inferences about others mental states (theory of mind). The term was first introduced by Premack & Woodruff (1978), and viewed as a theory as the mind is not directly observable.
Theory of mind includes visual perception, knowledge, beliefs and desires.
Discuss human development in terms of theory of mind
At 6 months humans can follow others gaze.
At 12 months they can understand others current visual access (attention, perspective).
At 24 months they can understand others’ past visual access.
At 42 months they understand others false beliefs
Discuss Flavell’s research
Level 1: Children can judge what a person can or cannot perceive from her viewpoint. Understand when another individual’s line of sight is blocked (by a barrier) about 1-2 years old.
Level 2: Not only what is visible from a certain point of view, but also how a given object is seen or presented at about 3-5 years old.
Discuss theory of mind in general.
ToM is considered fully fledged when children develop false belief understanding (3.5-4 years old).
Understanding that others can have false beliefs requires a fully representational ToM. Individuals must think “I appreciate that another individuals mental state contradicts mine AND reality”.
We can test it using the Sally-Anne test. It has strong demands on other cognitive skills, like executive function and verbal skills. Translation problems lead to major differences across cultures when SAT tests are used, so this is good.
15 months can pass the test but children with autism can’t.
Do animals have complex social cognitive skills?
Premack & Woodruff (1978) argue that their study was proof for ToM in chimpanzees, however, the chimp they tested was highly trained, so she possible learned by association or observation, and there was only one subject.
However there is no evidence for extrinsic false belief understanding in any non-human species, but one study has shown intrinsic understanding of others expectations.
Chimps have ToM but not in terms of a fully human-like belief-desire psychology in which they appreciate that others have mental representations. HOWEVER Chimps do not have a fully representational understanding of others mental states, therefore NO ToM???
Do animals understand seeing?
Brauer, Call & Tomasello (2005) found chimps can gaze follow. Great apes do not just orient to a target that another is orientated to, but they actually attempt to take the visual perspective of the other. Kaminski, Riedel, Call and Tomasello (2005), found domesticated goats are able to follow gaze direction and use social cues in an object choice test.
Discuss attention reading
Great apes change the modality of their gestures depending on the attentional state of the recipient.
Rhesus macaques differentiate an attentive from a non-attentive person when competing for food.
Dolphins change their indicative behaviours depending on the attentional state of the human-receiver.
Domestic dogs distinguish an attentive from a non-attentive person when begging for food.
Discuss the debate surrounding ToM in animals.
Chimpanzees understand some mental states. But the evil eye hypothesis can explain all results - one piece of food is contaminated because dominant has looked at it.
Chimpanzees read behaviour, not mental states and they do not have fully representational understanding of others mental states.
Animals learn rules by association and conditioning.
We need to be careful when studying this, to not be anthropomorphic, attribute intentions, beliefs and desires to almost everything. We use intentional terms when talking about inanimate objects.
Summarise this lecture
Many species follow gaze and are sensitive to others attentional state.
Different species seem to have some understanding of perspective taking- level 1.
Some species (chimps and corvids, but not dogs) understand what others have seen in the past.
Different species (chimps, orangutans and capuchins) are sensitive to the intentionality of others actions.
