Week 7

Question 1

Theory of mind

Answer 1

Awareness of one’s own mental processes and the mental processes of others. Important to understand the beliefs of others.
-Developing concepts of mental activity. Implies organizing facts and predicting (development connected to executive function). Aids in cooperation, competition (since can access that others are better than you), social interactions (understand others thoughts may be different than yours)

Question 2

2 prerequisite skills for theory of mind

Answer 2

1.Ability to view self and others’ behaviours as intentional; a being can cause actions, actional designed to achieve a goal.
2.Ability to take others perspectives (overcome egocentrism)

Question 3

3 mental states of theory of mind: perceptions

Answer 3

by 18m-3y begin to understand 3 mental states:
-Perceptions: by age 2 recognize what is in front of their eyes rather than their own, by 3 know that looking leads to knowing what’s inside a container.

Question 4

3 mental states of theory of mind: emotions

Answer 4

Emotions: Can distinguish between positive and negative emotions

Question 5

3 mental states of theory of mind: desires

Answer 5

-Desires: begins to recognise someone’s desires may be different than their own. Children often recognize desires earlier and more frequently than thinking and knowing.
False beliefs develop by age 5.
-5-7 years deepening understanding of the mind itself rather than an understanding of mental states. Eg behaviours don’t necessarily reflex though or feelings.
Middle to late childhood- go from understanding false beliefs to realizing the same event can be open to multiple interpretations.

Question 6

To test if a child has theory of mind: Content False-Belief Task (smarties task)

Answer 6

3 questions: what do you think is in the box? What will your friend think is in the box? (pass is say smarties, fail is say pencils), When you first saw the box, what did you think was inside? (fail if say pencils- since can’t hold all thoughts)
3 year olds tend to fail, 4 year olds pass

Question 7

Location false belief task (sally-Anne task)

Answer 7

3 year olds tend to fail; 4 year olds pass

Question 8

False belief task 4-5 year old’s

Answer 8

put pencils back in the box and ask what will your friend think is in the box now?- will respond to pencils (fail task) - understanding of others thinking is still shaky- third representation needed- can’t follow complex theory of mind.

Question 9

Social contexts:
-location false-belief tasks:

Answer 9

children pass at younger age if given the contect of sally wants to trick anne- learning occurring in social plane first- vygstky

Question 10

Autism Spectrum Disorder:

Answer 10

-Developmental disorder characterized by atypical social interactions
-Heritable, Abnormal brain functions
-Typically perform poorly on false-belief tasks: poor theory of mind? Poor executive functioning? Poor language? Overactivity of perceptual process-take mental capacity away from abstract reasoning needed for theory of mind?

Question 11

Rovee-Collier: infant memory

Answer 11

-Ribbon attached to infants 2-3m, infants learn that kicking moves the mobiles. Days or weeks later, shown mobile again- forget. If mobile is moved- trigger memory- w/ help learn faster than originally- so memory capacity exists. Next day tie foot to mobile again- infant kicks right away
Implications: An event from the past is remembered. Over time, events can no longer be recalled, a cue can serve to dredge up forgotten memories. Do better is tested in same context cues (eg striped crib)

Question 12

Memory development:

Answer 12

Memory storage: hippocampus; memory retrieval: frontal cortex
-linear increase in memory with age (in months) over the first 2 years- after 2 years improvements in executive functioning, use of strategies and knowledge base.

Question 13

Fuzzy trace theory:

Answer 13

-words presented orally to children age 7-11 and adults- manipulation: highly associated critical words not given (sleep demo). Participants given lists of words: identify which words were previously heard. Adults: 88%; 11: 76?; 7: 71%
-60% adults, 40% 11yrs, 22% yrs incorrectly recognized the critical world: older children and adults remember the gist of experience which will falsely trigger recognition of higher related words.
-older child is more likely to be biased by the gist, younger child more likely to remember precisely last nights events * limitation must be a recent event.

Question 14

Eyewitness testimony: facial recognition

Answer 14

-Children show poor face recognition accuracy particularly when: faces shown with novel expression, faces are shown from a new viewpoint. (even 8-10yrs is not good). 2-3 yrs old facial recognition also impaired by external paraphernalia

Question 15

Ceci et al: false events

Answer 15

False events: more than 50% of 3-4 yrs old said false events happened. 40% of 5-6 yrs old said false events happen. Often provided details
Cognitive limitations: children poor in recalling details of events due to limitations in executive function, strategies, knowledge, metacognition, memory capacity.

Question 16

Aspects of interview that might influence children;s response:

Answer 16

stereotype reinforcement (use of language- eg how fast was the car going when it crashed), authority figures, delayed recall, bribes/threats.

Question 17

Matthew Effect:

Answer 17

for to everyone who has, more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but from the one who does not have, even what he does have shall be taken away.
Reading: Good readers become better readers (enjoy reading and read more) and poor readers (struggle, and don’t read) are left behind more and more, so the gap widens

Question 18

Phonemic Awareness

Answer 18

-Knowledge that words consist of separable sounds- an auditory, not visual skill
-sound of words and visual coding don’t match- need to learn how to break up words not the way they sound but how you think they should be.
-Phonemic awareness is number one predictor of reading ability

Question 19

Phonemic Awareness : orthography

Answer 19

English has a deep orthography (the system for converting letters into sounds is irregular). eg . ghoti- fish. English has 40 phonemes; 1120 letter combinations vs Italian has 25 phonemes and 33 letter combinations (has a shallow orthography)

Question 20

Dyslexia

Answer 20

-Reading disability; reading ability significantly worse than intellectual ability would predict
-Can do arithmetic, communicate orally- everything buy reading (????)
-only about 10% are due to visual problems- rather most have to do with grapheme-phoneme correspondence
-Phonological processing is best predictor (eg. can you read “kika”)
-neurological basis likely genetic
-manifestation depends on grapheme-phoneme correspondence- shallot orthography- less difficulty

Question 21

Reading japanese:

Answer 21

Ma can be at the beginning, middle or end of the word- context tells you which ma is to be used. Japanese has a simple orthography

Question 22

Sex differences: reading

Answer 22

-Girls tend to perform better on reading tests than boys. Consistent across studies countries- likely genetic difference. Although statistically signticanct- absolute different is minor (functionally irrelevant)
-difference likely because boys are more affected by interest (impacts formal testing scores)
-dyslexia more prevalent in boys

Question 23

Heritability of cognitive abilities:

Answer 23

-Executive function is highly heritable; but greatly influenced by environment
-Hillman et al- physically fit children performed better at allocating attentional resources (likely genetic and environmental influences intertwined. (Sports-executive, genetic- physical active gene also better at executive function)

Question 24

Heritability of intelligence:

Answer 24

-genetic influence is mostly indirect
-parents’ genes dictate how parents behave towards their children (passive effects). Children’s genes dictate evocative and active effects on the environment

Question 25

SES (environment) impact on intelligence:

Answer 25

-children from high SES have higher IQ and academic achievement
-SEs correlated with home environment (more books in house), friend selection (friends with children whose parents also value education), neighborhood, academic expectations, academic opportunities (encouraged to read)

Question 26

Familial studies of intelligence:

Answer 26

Adoption studies: no genetic relationship between parents and children
Twin studies: Monozygotic twins separated at birth vs dizygotic twins
-correlation of intelligence increases as genetic similarity increases. Heritability of IQ=0.5.
-Effect of prenatal environment significant

Question 27

Scarr & Weinberg- paradoxical findings: SES impact on IQ (using race)

Answer 27

-Average IQ of adopted American children (of low SES), in white middle class families (higher SES- better nutrition, regimented schedule, IQ developed by white) had IQ scores of 20 points higher than comparable kids. *IQ scores increased no intellectual ability)
-Correlation is higher between children and biological mothers (r=0.43) than adoptive mothers (r=0.29).

Question 28

Correlation≠Absolute score

Answer 28

-Eg if correlation= 1- mother=child. Adopted into a rich family- everyone increases by 10 points. But mothers score still gives a prediction of the child’s IQ (increase 20 points). Environment impacts absolute score
-Significant correlation= knowing mom’s IQ helps predict child’s IQ

Question 29

How does early experience influence cognitive development?- Hymovitch 1952

Answer 29

-3 environments; normal cage (limited visual/motor experience), free environment (lots of visual/motor experience), stove pipe (negligible visual/motor experience)
-4 groups:
First type 30-75 days (early development-rats); 2nd type 75-120 days (adolescent rats)
-free environment→ stovepipe
-Stovepipe—> free environment
-Free environment entire time
-Normal age entire time (most deprived since never had free environment)
-Measured number of errors in 12 point maze. Free environment early on was most important (least errors), stove pipe first- worst

Question 30

Romanian orphanages:

Answer 30

-in attempt to increase population- but resulted in increased abandoned children in orphanages and state care. Adverse conditions of orphanages: overcrowding, insufficient funding, inadequate and sometimes abusive caregivers.

Question 31

Romanian orphanages: Physcial
cognitive and brain impacts

Answer 31

Physical effects: decreased height, weight and head circumference (brain).
Cognitive effects: Lowered IQ, often within intellectually disabled range (functionally different)
Effects on the brain: reduced cortical activity in prefrontal cortex, temporal lobe, hippocampus and amygdala. Less white matter in pathway between limbic system (reward) and frontal lobe (judgment, control)
-Some effects of deprivation may be reversible- particularly if removed in the first 2 years of life.

Question 32

Sources of failure of theory of mind tasks:

Answer 32

-Dual representation (cognitive limitation): fail to represent both the current location and previous location at the same time
-Poor executive functioning (planning, executing, inhibiting actions): difficulty in regulating behaviour (day/night task)

Question 33

Role of early experience IQ humans

Answer 33

-In humans, use naturalistic observations- observe home environments and correlate with IQ- unresponsive parenting, low SES, lack of stimulating play materials correlate with lower IQ
-Greater number of risk factors- lower IQ- even resolving 1 can make a difference