Origins of a theory of mind

Twenty-two pairs of typically developing toddlers (M = 24.32 months) and their mothers were observed in a play-room solving puzzles during 30 min. The target of the observations was hand-taking gesture. Researchers have thought that this gesture is rare among typically developing children and is more frequent among autistic children. Ten in 22 children showed this gesture in only 30 min. They should know “I can not do it by myself, but my mother can do it.” When we can assume that children know others’ mental mechanism, it might be the origins of a theory of mind.     

There is more to mind reading than having theory of mind concepts: new directions in theory of mind research

For more than 30 years, researchers have focused on the important transition that children undergo between the ages of 3 and 5, when they start to solve mind‐reading problems that require reasoning about complex mental states, such as beliefs. The main question for debate has been whether, during that transition, children acquire new concepts about how the mind works (i.e. a more sophisticated ‘theory of mind’) or whether their more general cognitive abilities improve and help them deal with the general task demands. Recently, researchers have started to explore mind‐reading abilities in individuals outside of the classic 3–5 age span, showing early theory of mind abilities in ever‐younger children and infants, but also far from flawless performance in adults. In this article, we show how the results of these two new lines of research converge on the idea that there is more to mind reading than having theory of mind concepts: there are various processes required to efficiently implement theory of mind concepts in our reasoning, and there may be, in fact, multiple mind‐reading routes available. We then highlight the emergent new directions for future research. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The bored mind is a guiding mind: toward a regulatory theory of boredom

By presenting and synthesizing findings on the character of boredom, the article advances a theoretical account of the function of the state of boredom. The article argues that the state of boredom should be understood as a functional emotion that is both informative and regulatory of one's behavior. Boredom informs one of the presence of an unsatisfactory situation and, at the same time, it motivates one to pursue a new goal when the current goal ceases to be satisfactory, attractive or meaningful. Boredom ultimately promotes both movement and the restoration of the perception that one's activities are meaningful and congruent with one's overall projects.     

From fancy to reason: Scaling deaf and hearing children's understanding of theory of mind and pretence

We examined deaf and hearing children's progression of steps in theory of mind (ToM) development including their understanding of social pretending. Ninety‐three children (33 deaf; 60 hearing) aged 3–13 years were tested on a set of six closely matched ToM tasks. Results showed that deaf children were delayed substantially behind hearing children in understanding pretending, false belief (FB) and other ToM concepts, in line with their delayed uptake of social pretend (SP) play. By using a scaling methodology, we confirmed previous evidence of a consistent five‐step developmental progression for both groups. Moreover, by including social pretence understanding, both deaf and hearing children's ToM sequences were shown to extend reliably to six sequential developmental steps. Finally and focally, even though both groups' sequences were six steps long, the placement of pretence relative to other ToM milestones varied with hearing status. Deaf children understood social pretending at an earlier step in the ToM sequence than hearing children, albeit at a later chronological age. Theoretically, the findings are relevant to questions about how universal developmental progressions come together along with culturally distinctive inputs and biological factors (such as hearing loss) to set the pace for ToM development.     

Teaching children to understand metaphors as a path leading to theory of mind development

The objective of the present study was to verify whether metaphors could be a tool in examining and teaching children's theory of mind (ToM) ability. Searching for sources of ToM development, we tried to stimulate mind-reading ability via metaphors. A group of 109 children participated in the project. Four and five-year-old participants (mean age 4 years, 11 months) were randomly divided into three groups: two experimental groups (with two kinds of prompts: direct, linguistic and indirect, contextual) and the controls. All the participating children were to solve three false beliefs and one metaphors test (with or without prompts). The results show that metaphors may provide an ecologically relevant and reliable tool for testing ToM in children. Although the methods employed to teach metaphors understanding proved ineffective, a critical analysis of the results provides important suggestions for further research.     

Hermeneutics and theory of mind

In contemporary philosophy and psychology there is an ongoing debate around the concept of theory of mind. Theory of mind concerns our ability to understand another person. The two approaches that dominate the debate are “Theory Theory” (TT) and “Simulation Theory” (ST). This paper explores the connection between theory of mind and hermeneutics. Although both speak of the nature of understanding, and the way we gain and organize our knowledge of others, certain aspects of Schleiermacher’s hermeneutics reflect a theory approach, long before TT itself was developed. In contrast, Dilthey’s hermeneutics reflects a simulation approach. In contrast to both of these approaches, I propose a contextual theory, as a parallel to Gadamer’s work in hermeneutics, and as a view that offers the basis for an important critique of both TT and ST.

Precursors of a theory of mind: A longitudinal study

The study examined whether the pointing gesture and intentional understanding abilities at 12 and 15 months of age predict the later understanding of perception and intention, as well as the ability to explain others' actions in a psychological way at 39 months of age. Thirty‐five infants (18 girls) were administered pointing and intention‐understanding tasks at the age of 12 and 15 months. Children were again evaluated at the age of 39 months with perception and intention tasks, and a psychological explanation task. Results showed that only 12‐month‐olds' comprehension of the pointing gesture with an imperative motive contributed to the prediction of later understanding of perception and mentalistic explanations of actions. Moreover, the ability of 12‐ and 15‐month‐olds to understand intentions contributed to the prediction of later preschool understanding of perceptions and intentions. These results indicate that a developmental trajectory in children's understanding of mental states from infancy to childhood is present, but depends on the level of engagement and communication that are required to perform these tasks.     

Representation and theory of mind development

This longitudinal study investigated the relation between children's early use of symbols and their later understanding of representation and metarepresentation. The performance of 64 children on DeLoache's (1987) scale model task was measured at 30, 36, and 42 months, and their false belief understanding was measured at 42 and 48 months. Language and executive function measures were taken at each time point. Scale model performance was related to concurrent and subsequent false belief understanding, and scale model performance both predicted and was predicted by language across time. Language predicted false belief within and across time, and with increasing age it mediated the relation between success on the scale model task and false belief understanding. Although executive function was related to performance on scale model and theory of mind tasks, it did not mediate the relation between these. This study provides evidence suggesting that symbolic functioning, language, and theory of mind may form part of a single skill set underlying symbolic representation.     

Infant attention to intentional action predicts preschool theory of mind

This research examines whether there are continuities between infant social attention and later theory of mind. Forty-five children were studied as infants and then again as 4-year-olds. Measures of infant social attention (decrement of attention during habituation to displays of intentional action) significantly predicted later theory of mind (false-belief understanding). Possibly, this longitudinal association could have been explained by more general developments in IQ, verbal competence, or executive function (rather than continuities in the realm of social cognition). However, the association remained significant and undiminished even when IQ, verbal competence, and executive function were controlled. The findings thus provide strong support for an important continuity in social cognition separable from continuities in more general information processing.     

An integrated theory of the mind

Adaptive control of thought-rational (ACT-R; J. R. Anderson & C. Lebiere, 1998) has evolved into a theory that consists of multiple modules but also explains how these modules are integrated to produce coherent cognition. The perceptual-motor modules, the goal module, and the declarative memory module are presented as examples of specialized systems in ACT-R. These modules are associated with distinct cortical regions. These modules place chunks in buffers where they can be detected by a production system that responds to patterns of information in the buffers. At any point in time, a single production rule is selected to respond to the current pattern. Subsymbolic processes serve to guide the selection of rules to fire as well as the internal operations of some modules. Much of learning involves tuning of these subsymbolic processes. A number of simple and complex empirical examples are described to illustrate how these modules function singly and in concert.     

Sibling conflict and theory of mind

This study examined conflicts between siblings in an attempt to identify variables that are related to false‐belief understanding. The variables investigated were children's use of mental state terms and specific types of arguments (Slomkowski & Dunn, 1992) that occurred during conflict episodes. Twenty‐two children between 3 and 5 years of age were administered eight false‐belief tasks and were also videotaped while playing with an older sibling. Use of other‐oriented arguments by the target child was significantly associated with success on false‐belief tasks after controlling for age and general language ability. No use of argument was negatively related to performance on the false‐belief tasks after controlling for age and general language ability. Neither the use of self‐oriented arguments nor use of mental state terms was found to be associated with false‐belief performance. The findings indicate that specific features of sibling conflicts are related to children's developing false‐belief understanding.     

Cognitive contributions to theory of mind ability in children with a traumatic head injury

The objective of the current study is to examine the contribution of intellectual abilities, executive functions (EF), and facial emotion recognition to difficulties in Theory of Mind (ToM) abilities in children with a traumatic head injury. Israeli children with a traumatic head injury were compared with their non-injured counterparts. Each group included 18 children (12 males) ages 7–13. Measurements included reading the mind in the eyes, facial emotion recognition, reasoning the other’s characteristics based on motive and outcome, Raven’s Coloured Progressive Matrices, similarities and digit span (Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children – Revised 95 subscales), verbal fluency, and the Behaviour Rating Inventory of Executive Functions. Non-injured children performed significantly better on ToM, abstract reasoning, and EF measures compared with children with a traumatic head injury. However, differences in ToM abilities between the groups were no longer significant after controlling for abstract reasoning, working memory, verbal fluency, or facial emotion recognition. Impaired ToM recognition and reasoning abilities after a head injury may result from other cognitive impairments. In children with mild and moderate head injury, poorer performance on ToM tasks may reflect poorer abstract reasoning, a general tendency to concretize stimuli, working memory and verbal fluency deficits, and difficulties in facial emotion recognition, rather than deficits in the ability to understand the other’s thoughts and emotions. ToM impairments may be secondary to a range of cognitive deficits in determining social outcomes in this population.     

Precursors to a theory of mind in infancy: perspectives for research on autism

There is ample evidence for a conceptual deficit in normally developing 3-year-olds' and autistic children's understanding of the mind. Recent research using nonverbal tasks has challenged this view since even 15-month-old infants appear to base their action predictions on a representation of the agent's beliefs (Onishi & Baillargeon, 2005). Our own findings from looking-time experiments indicate, however, that 16-month-olds' action predictions depend on behavioural and situational cues, rather than on a person's access to information. Further research is reviewed that indicates that 14-month-olds understand what another person can and cannot see, and that 18-month-olds predict a person's action from what she previously saw, when supported by behavioural cues. These findings support a constructivist view of a gradual understanding of conditions for knowing during the second year. The relevance of such findings for research on autism is discussed.     

Two reasons to abandon the false belief task as a test of theory of mind

The false belief task has often been used as a test of theory of mind. We present two reasons to abandon this practice. First, passing the false belief task requires abilities other than theory of mind. Second, theory of mind need not entail the ability to reason about false beliefs. We conclude with an alternative conception of the role of the false belief task.     

Bergson and the holographic theory of mind

Bergson’s model of time (1889) is perhaps the proto-phenomenological theory. It is part of a larger model of mind (1896) which can be seen in modern light as describing the brain as supporting a modulated wave within a holographic field, specifying the external image of the world, and wherein subject and object are differentiated not in terms of space, but of time. Bergson’s very concrete model is developed and deepened with Gibson’s ecological model of perception. It is applied to the problems of consciousness, direct realism, qualia and illusions. The model implies an entirely different basis for memory and cognition, and a brief overview is given for the basis of direct memory, compositionality and systematicity.     

Narrative discourse and theory of mind development

The authors examined experimentally whether exposure to social discourse about concepts related to mental states could promote changes in children's theory of mind understanding. In 2 studies, 3- to 4-year-old children were assigned to either a training or a no training control condition. All children were administered several theory of mind measures at pretest and 2 posttests. Training was not effective in improving performance in Study 1 (n = 37); but in Study 2 (n = 54), modifications of the training procedure led to significant improvements on measures of false belief and deception from pretest to 1st posttest. The findings support the influence of social discourse on children's theory of mind development.