Theory of Mind Chapter
What is Theory of Mind?
Understanding that others have different thoughts/preferences
What were the groups of the sample?
Children with autism
Children with Down syndrome
Clinically diagnosed ‘normal’ children
How many experiments were there in the study?
4
How did this study classify ADHD?
ADHD is a neurodevelopment disorder or a social disability
What did children say when they passed the false-belief task of Sally-Anne?
If the children succeeded, they pointed at the spot that Sally would expect the marble should be.
What was the main result of the study?
Autistic children fail to employ Theory of Mind.
Why might children fail the False-Belief task?
Lack of inhibitory control needed AND Inability to cope with concurrent processing demands
What kind of study was conducted?
A cross-sectional study at Tabriz University of Medical Science
What age do humans start understanding people?
Understanding people starts at birth
Which groups of participants were able to perform pretend play?
-Children with Down syndrome
- Diagnosed clinically ‘normal’
What Processes are involved in False Task-Beliefs?
False Belief Representation, Response Generation & Inhibitory Control
What is The Reading the Mind in the Eyes task?
28 images of eyes depicting different emotional states and the participants had to pick one of four emotions for each.
How is infant intention assessed for ToM development?
With the use of habituation/familiarization tasks that have the goal of getting the infant to attend to the event or object longer to build familiarity with it.
What was the response that was particular to children with autism?
They pointed to where the marble was exactly, even when it was in the instructor’s pocket
What did Experiment 1 consist of?
Traditional low-inhibition false belief task AND a practice trial to lower response generation demands
What were the characteristics of the sample?
-All boys
-drug naive
- IQ above 85
-30 with ADHD, 30 without
At what age did children start using words "like" and "want"
Between the age 2-3
How was IQ related to intellectual ability?
They were not related, IQ was independent of intellectual ability.
What were the outcomes of experiment 2?
-Confirmed that reducing response generation demands can enable children under 3 to succeed in the task
- Closer alignment of the practice and test trials were needed to reduce response generation demands
What were the results of the study?
Sally Anne: Half of the children with ADHD did not give the expected answer. Reading the Mind in the Eyes: Children with ADHD had a significantly lower performance than the control group.