Theory of Mind Flashcards
Theory of mind
Appreciating that other people have a set of beliefs and that everyone may have a differing set of beliefs
False-belief task
Wimmer and Perner, 1983
Kid put chocolate in blue cupboard, when he was away mom put chocolate in green cupboard.
4-year-olds would usually say that the kid would look for the chocolate in the green cupboard.
Sally-Anne Task
Baron-Cohen et al., 1985
Less complex false-belief task
Most 4 year-olds got it right
Most year-olds did not
Distinguishing mental states in language
3 year-olds seem to be able to distinguish between mental states and external reality
Relationship between seeing and knowing
3 y/o realise something of the relationship between seeing an object and knowing about that object
4 y/o realise that people may have a different view of the same object
Appearance-reality distinction
Flavell et al., 1986
Kids shown a sponge that looks like a rock. Can feel it to know it’s a sponge.
When 3 y/o is asked what it looks like they respond sponge.
4 y/o get it right
Predicting behaviour
2 y/o understands desires
3 y/o understands people have desires + beliefs about the world (cannot understand that people may act on false beliefs)
Theory of mind and language
Milligan et al., 2007
Reviewed over 100 studies, found that ToM was related to language development. Children who performed well in belief tasks had better language abilities
Ruffman et al., 1998
Found children with older siblings had a better understanding of false belief
Ellie and coke
Harris (1989)
By 5 y/o, children can understand that other people may have an incorrect representation of the world, and how this affects them
Sticker + mean puppet test
Peskin, 1992
3 and 4 y/o did not deceive the puppet
5 y/o did
4 y/o showed quick learning, and half did deceive in the second trial
Duck/rabbit test
Carpendale and Chandler, 1996
5 y/o could answer what Ann would think, but could not explain. Some 8 y/o also had trouble answering.
Takes time before kids are aware that the mind interprets reality.
Development of understanding the mind
Wellman, 1990
3 phases
Theory based on desire - 2 y/o - desire influences behaviour
Theory based on belief-desire psychology - 3 y/o
Metarepresentation
Perner, 1991
Occurs at about 4 y/o when kids understand false belief. Involves understanding what is being referred to, and what it is represented as.
Leslie, 1987
Used it to refer to pretend play; kids have a primary representation (ie a banana is a banana) and a secondary representation (ie a banana is a phone) (he called this metarepresentation)
Simulation
Harris, 1989
Children can project emotions and explanations for those emotions onto other people.
Harris (1991) argued that this way children can also work out other people’s desires and beliefs.
Two main features of autism
Kanner, 1943
Autistic aloness
Desire for sameness
Two major impairments in autism
American Psychiatric Association, 2013
Impairments in social communication
Evidence of restricted and repetitive patterns of behaviour and activities
ASD vs Typical vs Down syndrome
Baron-Cohen et al., 1985
Sally-Anne task
All had mental age above 4
80% of typical + DS kids got it right
20% of ASD kids got it right
Deception in kids with ASD
Sodian and Frith, 1992
Robber and box of sweets
Could sabotage the robber’s behaviour, but did not manage to manipulate its beliefs
Shared attention test
Baron-Cohen et al., 1995
In contrast to typically developing children, when chidren with ASD saw someone looking at one of four blocs of chocolate, they did not realise that it was that block that the person wanted.
