Does interference between self and other perspectives in theory of mind tasks reflect a common underlying process? Evidence from individual differences in theory of mind and inhibitory control

Theory of mind (ToM), the ability to understand that other agents have different beliefs, desires, and knowledge than oneself, has been extensively researched. Theory of mind tasks involve participants dealing with interference between their self-perspective and another agent’s perspective, and this interference has been related to executive function, particularly to inhibitory control. This study assessed whether there are individual differences in self–other interference, and whether these effects are due to individual differences in executive function. A total of 142 participants completed two ToM (the director task and a Level 1 visual perspective-taking task), which both involve self–other interference, and a battery of inhibitory control tasks. The relationships between the tasks were examined using path analysis. Results showed that the self–other interference effects of the two ToM tasks were dissociable, with individual differences in performance on the ToM tasks being unrelated and performance in each predicted by different inhibitory control tasks. We suggest that self–other differences are part of the nature of ToM tasks, but self–other interference is not a unitary construct. Instead, self–other differences result in interference effects in various ways and at different stages of processing, and these effects may not be a major limiting step for adults’ performance on typical ToM tasks. Further work is needed to assess other factors that may limit adults’ ToM performance and hence explain individual differences in social ability.

     

Children's difficulties handling dual identity

Thirty-nine 6-year-old children participated in a longitudinal study using tasks that required handling of dual identity. Pre- and posttest sessions employed tasks involving a protagonist who was partially informed about an object or person; for example, he knew an item as a ball but not as a present. Children who judged correctly that the protagonist did not know the ball was a present (thereby demonstrating some understanding of the consequences of limited information access), often judged incorrectly (1) that he knew that there was a present in the box, and (2) that he would search as if fully informed. Intervening sessions added contextual support and tried to clarify the experimenter's communicative intentions in a range of ways. Despite signs of general improvement, the distinctive pattern of errors persisted in every case. These findings go beyond previous studies of children's handling of limited information access, and are hard to accommodate within existing accounts of developing understanding of the mind.     

How do alternative ways of responding influence 3- and 4-year-olds’ performance on tests of executive function and theory of mind?

A total of 69 preschool children were tested on measures of false belief understanding (the Unexpected Transfer task), inhibitory control (the Grass/Snow task), and strategic reasoning (the Windows task). For each task, children indicated their response either by pointing with their index finger or by using a nonstandard response mode (pointing with a rotating arrow). The means of responding had no effect on children's performance on the Grass/Snow task or on the Unexpected Transfer task, although children performed better on the Unexpected Transfer task when the key object in the story was removed. In contrast, performance on the Windows task was significantly better when children pointed with the rotating arrow. A follow-up experiment with 79 preschoolers found that this improved performance on the Windows task was sustained even after the nonstandard response mode was removed and children again pointed with their finger. These findings together suggest that nonstandard response modes do not help children to inhibit prepotent pointing responses but may help them to formulate response strategies on reasoning tasks by discouraging unreflective impulsive responding.     

非小细胞肺癌 EG FR 基因突变检测与临床意义

采用荧光PCR法对199例晚期非小细胞肺癌（NSCLC ）组织进行表皮生长因子受体（EGFR ）基因突变检测,分析EGFR基因突变的分布特征及其与临床病理特征的相关性。结果显示56例（28．1％）存在EGFR基因突变,其中27例（13．6％）为外显子19突变,25例（12．6％）为外显子21突变,2例为外显子18突变,1例外显子20突变,1例外显子18和20的共突变。另外,除广东及安徽省铜陵市外,辽宁地区NSCLC患者EGFR基因突变率及主要突变类型与其他地区相符,常见于外显子19、21突变,其中腺癌、不吸烟患者突变率更高,更适宜EGFR-TKI靶向治疗。     

Is belief reasoning automatic?

Understanding the operating characteristics of theory of mind is essential for understanding how beliefs, desires, and other mental states are inferred, and for understanding the role such inferences could play in other cognitive processes. We present the first investigation of the automaticity of belief reasoning. In an incidental false-belief task, adult subjects responded more slowly to unexpected questions concerning another person's belief about an object's location than to questions concerning the object's real location. Results in other conditions showed that responses to belief questions were not necessarily slower than responses to reality questions, as subjects showed no difference in response times to belief and reality questions when they were instructed to track the person's beliefs about the object's location. The results suggest that adults do not ascribe beliefs to agents automatically.     

Executive function is necessary for perspective selection,not Level-1 visual perspective calculation: Evidence from a dual-task study of adults

Previous research suggests that perspective-taking and other “theory of mind” processes may be cognitively demanding for adult participants, and may be disrupted by concurrent performance of a secondary task. In the current study, a Level-1 visual perspective task was administered to 32 adults using a dual-task paradigm in which the secondary task tapped executive function. Results suggested that the secondary task did not affect the calculation of perspective, but did affect the selection of the relevant (Self or Other) perspective for a given trial. This is the first direct evidence of a cognitively efficient process for “theory of mind” in adults that operates independently of executive function. The contrast between this and previous findings points to a distinction between simple perspective-taking and the more complex and cognitively demanding abilities more typically examined in studies of “theory of mind”. It is suggested that these findings may provide a parsimonious explanation of the success of infants on ‘indirect’ measures of perspective-taking that do not explicitly require selection of the relevant perspective.     

Online usage of theory of mind continues to develop in late adolescence

The development of theory of mind use was investigated by giving a computerized task to 177 female participants divided into five age groups: Child I (7.3–9.7 years); Child II (9.8–11.4); Adolescent I (11.5–13.9); Adolescent II (14.0–17.7); Adults (19.1–27.5). Participants viewed a set of shelves containing objects, which they were instructed to move by a ‘director’ who could see some but not all of the objects. Correct interpretation of critical instructions required participants to use the director’s perspective and only move objects that the director could see. In a control condition, participants were asked to ignore objects in slots with a grey background. Accuracy improved similarly in both conditions between Child I and Adolescent II. However, while performance of the Adolescent II and Adult groups did not differ in the control condition, the Adolescent II group made more errors than the adults in the experimental condition. These results suggest that theory of mind use improves between late adolescence and adulthood. Thus, while theory of mind tasks are passed by age 4, these data indicate that the interaction between theory of mind and executive functions continues to develop in late adolescence.     

The executive demands of strategic reasoning are modified by the way in which children are prompted to think about the task: Evidence from 3- to 4-year-olds

We investigated a test of strategic reasoning (the Windows task) that in different studies has yielded contrasting pictures of young children's executive abilities [Russell, J., Mauthner, N., Sharpe, S., & Tidswell, T. (1991). The “windows task” as a measure of strategic deception in preschoolers and autistic subjects. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 9, 331–349; Samuels, M. C., Brooks, P. J., & Frye, D. (1996). Strategic game playing through the windows task. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 14, 159–172]. An experiment with 52 three- to four-year-olds showed robust effects of different wordings for the prompts used to ask children to respond, and found that a single exposure to the facilitating wording led to improved performance on subsequent trials where the standard wording was used. This suggests that the effect of the wording was to help children infer an appropriate basis for responding, and not to reduce the trial-by-trial working memory or inhibitory demands of the task.     

Testing the domain-specificity of a theory of mind deficit in brain-injured patients: evidence for consistent performance on non-verbal, "reality-unknown" false belief and false photograph tasks

To test the domain-specificity of "theory of mind" abilities we compared the performance of a case-series of 11 brain-lesioned patients on a recently developed test of false belief reasoning () and on a matched false photograph task, which did not require belief reasoning and which addressed problems with existing false photograph methods. A strikingly similar pattern of performance was shown across the false belief and false photograph tests. Patients who were selectively impaired on false belief tasks were also impaired on false photograph tasks; patients spared on false belief tasks also showed preserved performance with false photographs. In some cases the impairment on false belief and false photograph tasks coincided with good performance on control tasks matched for executive demands. We discuss whether the patients have a domain-specific deficit in reasoning about representations common to both false belief and false photograph tasks.     

Willing and able? Theory of mind,social motivation,and social competence in middle childhood and early adolescence

This study investigated the links between theory of mind, social motivation, and children's social competence in middle childhood and early adolescence. Two hundred and sixty four children (136 girls, 128 boys) aged between 8 and 13 years (M Age = 10.88 years, SD = 1.45) completed theory-of-mind tests and self-report questionnaires measuring social motivation. Teachers rated children's social competence at school. Teacher-rated social competence was associated with individual differences in both theory of mind and children's motivation to develop and maintain social relationships. Results suggest that while individual differences in social motivation and theory of mind are partially overlapping, both theory of mind ability and social motivation contribute to successful social interaction at school.