One Other Explanation: ToM Flashcards
What is the theory of mind?
Understanding people’s mental states means we can interpret and predict their behaviour - when we develop this understanding, we develop a theory of mind.
- the recognition that other people have thoughts, emotions and intentions of their own
- this ability is impaired with ASD
- Baron-Cohen et al sees mind blindness as a symptom and ASD accounts for social and communication impairments
Foundations of ToM
Appearance versus reality - something that looks like one thing doesn’t actually have to be that thing
Physical vs mental - one child holds a glass of pop and the other thinks about a glass of pop. ‘Who can drink from their glass of pop’
Testing ToM deficits
Sally Anne test
Where willl sally look for her marble = in basket - one person can hold a different view of the world is ToM
- controls of people with Down syndrome with low IQ show intelligence is not the issues and had 86% corrects answer
- nerurotypical 85%
- ASD 20%
Eye test
ASD found it hard to distinguish between emotions - an impaired ability to infer emotional states from facial expresssions, especially since language not included.. dictionary given
Incomplete explanation
ToM does not account for o5er symptoms such as repetitive behaviours and and interests that are not apart of the social and emotional defects. Also, 20% pass the sally Anne test showing other factors must be involved. Lacks validity as not comprehensive enough
Biological explanation
Neurochemical explanations may account for it better and offer treatments potentially
Application
Target for intervention
- child programme to improve their joint attention skills compared with controls, language skills were improved and improvement still apparent after 5 years. Treating ASD as a ToM deficit produces beneficial outcomes , especially when children can start school with better language skills
But, another study suggests improvements are short lived so have limited appplication
