Does the Past Shape Anticipation for the Future?

2018 ◽  
Vol 226 (2) ◽  
pp. 122-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristin Hansen Lagattuta ◽  
Sarah M. Tashjian ◽  
Hannah J. Kramer
Keyword(s):  
Executive Function ◽  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Cognitive Skills ◽  
Life History Theory ◽  
Life Experiences ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Positive Association ◽  
Mental States ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Mind

Abstract. A positive association between executive function (a set of higher order, self-regulatory cognitive skills) and theory of mind (beliefs about mental states) has been well documented during early childhood. As investigations extend beyond false belief understanding (that the mind can misrepresent reality), there is growing interest in examining contributions of executive function to more advanced aspects of theory of mind in older age groups. To add to this literature, we showed 4- to 10-year-olds and adults (N = 274) scenarios in which a perpetrator acted positively (P) and/or negatively (N) toward a focal character on two separate days (PP, NN, NP, and PN). Participants inferred focal characters’ future-oriented mental states upon seeing perpetrators for the third time. Children and adults also completed executive function measures (working memory and inhibitory control). Both age and executive function independently predicted higher life history theory of mind: Recognition that prior life experiences influence how individuals think, feel, and make decisions about the future.

Sources of cognitive conflict and their relevance to Theory of Mind proficiency in healthy ageing. A preregistered study.

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Foyzul Rahman ◽  
Sabrina Javed ◽  
Ian Apperly ◽  
Peter Hansen ◽  
Carol Holland ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Executive Control ◽  
Spatial Working Memory ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Response Speed ◽  
Cognitive Conflict ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Outcome Knowledge

Age-related decline in Theory of Mind (ToM) may be due to waning executive control, which is necessary for resolving conflict when reasoning about others’ mental states. We assessed how older (OA; n=50) versus younger adults (YA; n=50) were affected by three theoretically relevant sources of conflict within ToM: competing Self-Other perspectives; competing cued locations and outcome knowledge. We examined which best accounted for age-related difficulty with ToM. Our data show unexpected similarity between age groups when representing a belief incongruent with one’s own. Individual differences in attention and motor response speed best explained the degree of conflict experienced through conflicting Self-Other perspectives. However, OAs were disproportionately affected by managing conflict between cued locations. Age and spatial working memory were most relevant for predicting the magnitude of conflict elicited by conflicting cued locations. We suggest that previous studies may have underestimated OA’s ToM proficiency by including unnecessary conflict in ToM tasks.

scholarly journals Predictive context biases binocular rivalry in children and adults with no positive relation to two measures of social cognition

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Valuch ◽  
Louisa Kulke
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Binocular Rivalry ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Cognitive Skills ◽  
Social Cognitive ◽  
Contextual Information ◽  
Positive Association ◽  
Similar Degree ◽  
Eye Dominance ◽  
Adult Participants

Integration of prior experience and contextual information can help to resolve perceptually ambiguous situations and might support the ability to understand other peoples’ thoughts and intentions, called Theory of Mind. We studied whether the readiness to incorporate contextual information for resolving binocular rivalry is positively associated with Theory-of-Mind-related social cognitive abilities. In children (12 to 13 years) and adults (18 to 25 years), a predictive temporal context reliably modulated the onset of binocular rivalry to a similar degree. In contrast, adult participants scored better on measures of Theory of Mind compared to children. We observed considerable interindividual differences regarding the influence of a predictive context on binocular rivalry, which were associated with differences in sensory eye dominance. The absence of a positive association between predictive effects on perception and Theory of Mind performance suggests that predictive effects on binocular rivalry and higher-level Theory-of-Mind-related abilities stem from different neurocognitive mechanisms. We conclude that the influence of predictive contextual information on basic visual processes is fully developed at an earlier age, whereas social cognitive skills continue to evolve from adolescence to adulthood.

scholarly journals Cognitive and affective Theory of Mind in adolescence: developmental aspects and associated neuropsychological variables

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edith Theresa Gabriel ◽  
Raphaela Oberger ◽  
Michaela Schmoeger ◽  
Matthias Deckert ◽  
Stefanie Vockh ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Language Comprehension ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Late Adolescents ◽  
Affective Processes ◽  
Neuropsychological Tasks ◽  
Neuropsychological Variables

Abstract Theory of Mind (ToM) is the ability to represent and attribute mental states to oneself and others. So far, research regarding ToM processing across adolescence is scarce. Existing studies either yield inconsistent results or did not or not thoroughly investigate aspects like higher order ToM and associated neuropsychological variables which the current study tried to address. 643 typically developing early, middle, and late adolescents (age groups 13–14; 15–16; 17–18) performed cognitive and affective ToM tasks as well as neuropsychological tasks tapping the cognitive or affective domain. Regarding both ToM types, 15- to 16-year-olds and 17- to 18-year-olds outperformed 13- to 14-year-olds, whereas females were superior regarding cognitive ToM. Across adolescence, cognitive and affective ToM correlated with attention and affective intelligence, whereas working memory, language comprehension, and figural intelligence additionally correlated with cognitive ToM. In early adolescence, attention correlated with both ToM types, whereas cognitive ToM further correlated with language comprehension and affective ToM with verbal intelligence, verbal fluency, and verbal flexibility. In middle and late adolescence, affective intelligence correlated with both ToM types, whereas cognitive ToM additionally correlated with working memory, language comprehension, and figural intelligence. The current study shows a developmental step regarding cognitive and affective ToM in middle adolescence as well as gender differences in cognitive ToM processing. Associations between neuropsychological variables and ToM processing were shown across adolescence and within age groups. Results give new insights into social cognition in adolescence and are well supported by neuroscientific and neurobiological studies regarding ToM and the integration of cognitive and affective processes. Graphic abstract

scholarly journals Importance of language for children’s theory of mind: Comparison of verbal and nonverbal theory of mind tasks

Psihologija ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 23-23
Author(s):  
Sanja Simlesa ◽  
Kaja Hacin ◽  
Maja Cepanec ◽  
Jasmina Ivsac-Pavlisa
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Language Comprehension ◽  
Cognitive Skills ◽  
Mental States ◽  
False Belief ◽  
Hierarchical Regression ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Typically Developing Children ◽  
The Past ◽  
Verbal Tasks

The ability to attribute mental states to oneself and others, known as the theory of mind (ToM), has been widely researched over the past 40 years, along with its relation to language comprehension. However, a majority of the research on the relation between ToM and language used only verbal tasks assessing false belief understanding as a measure of ToM. Therefore, this study aimed to analyze the relation between language and ToM, using a larger battery of ToM measures, with different language demands. A total of 203 typically developing children between 46 and 68 months of age, with average nonverbal cognitive skills, were assessed using language comprehension and ToM tasks. The language aspect was assessed using the Reynell Developmental Language Scales (Language Comprehension scale A). To assess ToM, verbal and non-verbal tasks were taken from the ToM subtest of the NEPSY-II. Results indicated a significant correlation between language comprehension and verbal and non-verbal ToM measures. Hierarchical regression showed that language comprehension was a significant predictor for children's performance on both verbal and non-verbal ToM tasks. Specifically, language comprehension affected ToM, regardless of the language demands of the ToM tasks. However, language comprehension was a stronger predictor for verbal than non-verbal ToM tasks. The results of this study contribute to the view that the relation between language and ToM is fundamental and exceeds the features of specific tasks.

scholarly journals Changes in Knowledge Across Time

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenda Parsons ◽  
Vivian Rigg ◽  
Della Boudreau ◽  
Ellen Doucet ◽  
Lily Toutounji ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Child Development ◽  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Cognitive Skills ◽  
Developmental Psychology ◽  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Metacognitive Skills ◽  
Study Materials ◽  
The Future ◽  
Online Format ◽  
Changes Over Time

Our study focuses on children’s understanding of their own knowledge and how it changes over time. Preschool-aged children perform above chance when asked about current knowledge, but only children older than 5 years of age performed above chance for past, future, or intraindividual knowledge (Atance & Caza, 2018; Caza et al., 2016). However, we do not currently know whether awareness of past and future knowledge is related. While this type of awareness seems conceptually related to metacognition (the awareness of one’s own ignorance or knowledge; Rohwer et al., 2012), the relation to this skill is unknown. Thus, the goal of the current study is to investigate how children’s awareness of their own epistemic knowledge is related to their metacognitive abilities. This study will explore children between the ages of 3.5- through 5-years-old, who will be assessed on their understanding of their current, past, and future knowledge, as well as other tasks assessing metacognitive skills. Further, we will explore the role of theory of mind and inhibitory control. We predict that children who do well on the epistemic knowledge task for the past will display better performance on the task asking about the future, and that both will be related to the other cognitive skills measured. Due to the current global situation, we converted our study materials to an online format. Our poster will highlight this process and discuss ways to approach challenges in online developmental testing. Though data collection is ongoing, we present initial insight into the process, drawbacks, and benefits of online testing. Keywords: Epistemic Knowledge, Metacognition, Theory of Mind, Child Development     References Atance, C. M., & Caza, J. S. (2018). “Will I know more in the future than I know now?” Preschoolers’ judgments about changes in general knowledge. Developmental Psychology, 54(5), 857–865. http://dx.doi.org.proxy.library.carleton.ca/10.1037/dev0000480 Caza, J. S., Atance, C. M., & Bernstein, D. M. (2016). Older (but not younger) preschoolers understand that knowledge differs between people and across time. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 34(3), 313–324. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjdp.12130 Rohwer, M., Kloo, D., & Perner, J. (2012). Escape from metaignorance: How children develop an understanding of their own lack of knowledge. Child Development, 83(6), 1869–1883. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2012.01830.x

scholarly journals The Ape That Lived to Tell the Tale. The Evolution of the Art of Storytelling and Its Relationship to Mental Time Travel and Theory of Mind

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elias Garcia-Pelegrin ◽  
Clive Wilkins ◽  
Nicola S. Clayton
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Time Travel ◽  
The Self ◽  
Mental Time Travel ◽  
Present Condition ◽  
The Past ◽  
Time Space ◽  
The Future ◽  
Past Experiences

Engaging in the art of creating and telling stories is a defining behaviour of humankind. Humans have been sharing stories with each other, with and without words, since the dawn of recorded history, but the cognitive foundations of the behaviour can be traced deeper into our past. The emergence of stories can be strongly linked to Mental Time Travel (the ability to recall the past and imagine the future) and plays a key role in our ability to communicate past, present and future scenarios with other individuals, within and beyond our lifetimes. Stories are products engraved within the concept of time, constructed to elucidate the past experiences of the self, but designed with the future in mind, thus imparting lessons of such experiences to the receiver. By being privy to the experiences of others, humans can imagine themselves in a similar position to the protagonist of the story, thus mentally learning from an experience they might have never encountered other than in the mind's eye. Evolutionary Psychology investigates how the engagement in artistic endeavours by our ancestors in the Pleistocene granted them an advantage when confronted with obstacles that challenged their survival or reproductive fitness and questions whether art is an adaptation of the human mind or a spandrel of other cognitive adaptations. However, little attention has been placed on the cognitive abilities that might have been imperative for the development of art. Here, we examine the relationship between art, storytelling, Mental Time Travel and Theory of Mind (i.e., the ability to attribute mental states to others). We suggest that Mental Time Travel played a key role in the development of storytelling because through stories, humans can fundamentally transcend their present condition, by being able to imagine different times, separate realities, and place themselves and others anywhere within the time space continuum. We argue that the development of a Theory of Mind also sparked storytelling practises in humans as a method of diffusing the past experiences of the self to others whilst enabling the receiver to dissociate between the past experiences of others and their own, and to understand them as lessons for a possible future. We propose that when artistic products rely on storytelling in form and function, they ought to be considered separate from other forms of art whose appreciation capitalise on our aesthetic preferences.

scholarly journals Genetic contribution to ‘theory of mind’ in adolescence

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Varun Warrier ◽  
Simon Baron-Cohen
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Cognitive Empathy ◽  
P Value ◽  
Association Analyses ◽  
Cognitive Aptitude ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Polygenic Scores ◽  
Psychiatric Conditions ◽  
The Mind

AbstractDifficulties in ‘theory of mind’ (the ability to attribute mental states to oneself or others, and to make predictions about another’s behaviour based on these attributions) have been observed in several psychiatric conditions. We investigate the genetic architecture of theory of mind in 4,577 13-year-olds who completed the Emotional Triangles Task (Triangles Task), a first-order test of theory of mind. We observe a small but significant female-advantage on the Triangles Task (Cohen’s d = 0.19, P < 0.01), in keeping with previous work using other tests of theory of mind. Genome-wide association analyses did not identify any significant loci, and SNP heritability was small and non-significant. Polygenic scores for six psychiatric conditions (ADHD, anorexia, autism, bipolar disorder, depression, and schizophrenia), and empathy were not associated with scores on the Triangles Task. However, polygenic scores of cognitive aptitude, and cognitive empathy, a term synonymous with theory of mind and measured using the “Reading the Mind in the Eyes” Test, were significantly associated with scores on the Triangles Task at multiple P-value thresholds, suggesting shared genetics between different measures of theory of mind and cognition.

scholarly journals Sources of Cognitive Conflict and Their Relevance to Theory-of-Mind Proficiency in Healthy Aging: A Preregistered Study

2021 ◽  
pp. 095679762110178
Author(s):  
Foyzul Rahman ◽  
Klaus Kessler ◽  
Ian A. Apperly ◽  
Peter C. Hansen ◽  
Sabrina Javed ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Healthy Aging ◽  
Spatial Working Memory ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Response Speed ◽  
Cognitive Conflict ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Outcome Knowledge

Age-related decline in theory of mind (ToM) may be due to waning executive control, which is necessary for resolving conflict when reasoning about other individuals’ mental states. We assessed how older ( n = 50) and younger ( n = 50) adults were affected by three theoretically relevant sources of conflict within ToM: competing self-other perspectives, competing cued locations, and outcome knowledge. We examined which best accounted for age-related difficulty with ToM. Our data show unexpected similarity between age groups when people are representing a belief incongruent with their own. Individual differences in attention and response speed best explained the degree of conflict experienced through incompatible self-other perspectives. However, older adults were disproportionately affected by managing conflict between cued locations. Age and spatial working memory were most relevant for predicting the magnitude of conflict elicited by conflicting cued locations. We suggest that previous studies may have underestimated older adults’ ToM proficiency by including unnecessary conflict in ToM tasks.

Theory of Mind and Communication in Health and Risk Messaging

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Jeffrey Farrar ◽  
Yao Guan ◽  
Kaitlyn Erhardt
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Risk Taking ◽  
Perspective Taking ◽  
Effective Communication ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Developmental Time ◽  
Physical World ◽  
Reduce Risk ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Risk Taking Behaviors

Humans live not only in a physical world but also in a mental world. Theory of mind reflects the understanding that the mind is comprised of different mental states, such as intentions, desires, and beliefs. This conception of the mind is a critical achievement in human development because it directly impacts effective communication and social interaction. It allows for the understanding of others’ behaviors by inferring their mental states. The formation of a theory of mind has been a central topic in psychology, neuroscience, cognitive science, and philosophy. It impacts related processes, such as communication skills, perspective-taking ability, and social cognition. Across the life span, the understanding of the mind becomes increasingly complex. Early in development, infants and toddlers can discern the intentions of others. Later, more sophisticated reasoning about the mental states of others becomes possible. For instance, the ability to follow and understand the recursive thought that “Sam believes, that Mary said, that Jose wanted . . .” develops. Additionally, within distinctive developmental time periods, people differ in their ability to take into account mental states. Once people’s beliefs, including their misconceptions, are identified, it is possible to generate effective communication strategies designed to teach, learn, and even reduce risk-taking behaviors.

scholarly journals Validation of the Revised Ego-Resiliency Scale in a High-Vulnerable Colombian Population

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-13
Author(s):  
Giovanni Maria Vecchio ◽  
Barbara Barcaccia ◽  
Paolo Raciti ◽  
Paloma Vivaldi Vera ◽  
Michela Milioni
Keyword(s):  
Life Experiences ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Positive Association ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Configural Invariance ◽  
Victims Of Violence ◽  
And Coping ◽  
Town Halls ◽  
Over 40 Years ◽  
Ego Resiliency

The ER89 (Block & Kremen, 1996) is a self-report scale measuring ego-resiliency in community contexts. The present study examined the psychometric properties of a brief version of the ER 89 (ER89-R: Alessandri, Vecchio, Steca, Caprara, & Caprara, 2007) in a Colombian high-vulnerable population. Participants were 947 young and adults (427 males, 520 females), ranging in age from 16 to 66 years (M = 32.4, SD = 11.6), living in fourteen town halls and beneficiaries of four programs for individuals in situations of extreme poverty or victims of violence. CFA supported the presence of the ER second-order factor and two first-order factors, named Optimal regulation (OR) and Openness to life experiences (OL). In addition, results showed full configural invariance of the scales across three age groups (16-25 years, 26-40 years and over 40 years) and partial strict invariance by gender. The construct validity of the ER89-R was further examined by zero-order correlations and multiple regression analyses: significant and positive association of ER, OR and OL with some relevant indicators of adjustment (self-esteem, optimism, and coping strategies) were found. Important implications for intervention programs aimed at people in disadvantaged contexts are discussed.

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