Putting theory of mind in its place: psychological explanations of the socio-emotional-communicative impairments in autistic spectrum disorder

Autism ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 226-246 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jill Boucher
2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (5) ◽  
pp. 411-431
Author(s):  
Robert N. McCauley ◽  
George Graham ◽  
A. C. Reid

AbstractThe cognitive science of religions’ By-Product Theory contends that much religious thought and behavior can be explained in terms of the cultural activation of maturationally natural cognitive systems. Those systems address fundamental problems of human survival, encompassing such capacities as hazard precautions, agency detection, language processing, and theory of mind. Across cultures they typically arise effortlessly and unconsciously during early childhood. They are not taught and appear independent of general intelligence. Theory of mind (mentalizing) undergirds an instantaneous and automatic intuitive understanding of minds, mental representations, and their implications for agents’ actions. By-Product theorists hypothesize about a social cognition content bias, holding that mentalizing capacities inform participants’ implicit understanding of religious representations of agents with counter-intuitive properties. That hypothesis, in combination with Baron-Cohen’s account of Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) in terms of diminished theory of mind capacities (what he calls “mind-blindness”), suggests an impaired religious understanding hypothesis. It proposes that people with ASD have substantial limitations in intuitive understanding of and creative inferences from such representations. Norenzayan argues for a mind-blind atheism hypothesis, which asserts that the truth of these first two hypotheses suggests that people with ASD have an increased probability, compared to the general population, of being atheists. Numerous empirical studies have explored these three hypotheses’ merits. After carefully pondering distinctions between intuitive versus reflective mentalizing and between explicit versus implicit measures and affective versus cognitive measures of mentalizing, the available empirical evidence provides substantial support for the first two hypotheses and non-trivial support for the third.


Author(s):  
Robert N. McCauley ◽  
George Graham

The only exceptions that prove principles are those whose exceptional status those principles explain. People with autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) tend to be more attentive to details, more likely to apprehend events mechanistically, and more inclined to systemize about both than does the general population. Considerable evidence suggests that they are also far less likely to possess ready intuitions about the workings of people’s minds and that even high-functioning people with ASD are mindblind. If the by-product theory of religious representations is correct, then people with ASD will lack intuitive insight about religious representations of gods as minded agents and find creative inferences with them challenging. Theorists differ about how extensive such limitations will be, especially in light of the ability of some people with ASD to laboriously piece together a partial, ersatz theory of mind over time. Overall the available empirical research mostly corroborates these proposals about these limitations.


2018 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 99
Author(s):  
Oktafian Farhan ◽  
Agus Subekti

Autisme merupakan disabilitas perkembangan yang dialami sepanjang hidup penderita Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Semakin cepat ditangani, semakin besar kemungkinan anak akan kembali normal. Untuk alasan ini, diperlukan metode baru yang dapat membantu orang tua dengan cepat mengenali gejala autisme pada anak-anak mereka. Dalam studi sebelumnya yang dilakukan oleh Fadi Fayez Tabhtah, suatu data set dihasilkan untuk mendeteksi apakah seorang anak memiliki autisme atau tidak. Tetapi penelitiannya hanya menghasilkan data set, ia tidak memeriksa lebih lanjut dimana algoritma cocok untuk data set yang telah dihasilkan. Atribut data set ternyata memiliki nilai yang salah, yang mengundang pertanyaan tentang keakurasian data. Dalam penelitian ini peneliti menggunakan metode CRISP-DM dan menguji keakuratan data set penelitian sebelumnya menggunakan algoritma C.45. Selanjutnya, aplikasi WEKA menggunakan pemilihan fitur dan pengaruh dari nilai yang salah untuk setiap atribut dan menemukan atribut yang paling signifikan. Atribut-atribut ini kemudian diuji dengan algoritma C.45 sehingga model prediksi dari data set diperoleh. Atribut A6 dari perhitungan pohon keputusan tidak muncul sama sekali sebagai cabang. Sebuah model baru diperoleh di mana atribut A6 dihilangkan, sehingga ketika diukur oleh algoritma C.45, nilai akurasi yang lebih baik diperoleh. Hasil model baru kemudian diuji pada data kuesioner baru, yang menghasilkan prediksi yang tepat.


2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 390-402 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah A. Khan ◽  
Shahida A. Khan ◽  
A.R. Narendra ◽  
Gohar Mushtaq ◽  
Solafa A. Zahran ◽  
...  

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (7) ◽  
pp. 924
Author(s):  
Claudia B. Pratesi ◽  
Alessandra Baeza Garcia ◽  
Riccardo Pratesi ◽  
Lenora Gandolfi ◽  
Mariana Hecht ◽  
...  

Studies have shown that children and adolescents with autism and their relatives present a high level of stress and more family problems, impacting parents’ and caregivers’ quality of life (QoL). Despite studies on this subject, there is no specific questionnaire to evaluate QoL in parents or caregivers of children and adolescents with an autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) in Brazil. Therefore, this study’s primary purpose was to develop and validate a specific questionnaire to evaluate QoL in these individuals. The study was performed using the following steps: development of the ASD Parent/caregiver QoL questionnaire (autistic spectrum disorder parent/caregiver quality of life—ASDPC-QoL), subjective evaluation, validation of the questionnaire by the Delphi method, assessment of internal consistency, responsiveness, and reliability of the ASLPC-QoL, and administration of the questionnaire to 881 Brazilian ASD caregivers or parents. ASDPC-QoL comprises 28 questions divided into four domains (social, concerns, physical and mental health) with good psychometric properties (reproducibility, reliability, internal consistency, responsiveness, and validity). Our data showed that worries and physical health were the domains with the lowest scores in ASDPCA-QoL. ASDPCA-QoL did not differ among gender and age of child considering the total and all domains. Older participants (≥41 y/o) presented the best scores for social and worries domains but did not differ in other domains and the total. Parents or caregivers of ASD children diagnosed for more than three years have better mental and physical health domains than those recently diagnosed (up to 1 year) but did not differ in the total and other domains. Individuals with a partner and with the highest educational level present the best score for the social domain. Employed individuals showed better scores than unemployed ones for all domains and the total, except for worries, which did not differ. It also occurred comparing the individuals that do not use antidepressants and the ones that use them. Assessing and better understanding the QoL of caregivers is highly relevant. By understanding the social, worries, physical, and emotional health domains of caregivers, it is possible to track harmful aspects, prevent and treat pathologies, in addition to assisting in the implementation of effective public policies.


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