scholarly journals Mentalizing Bodies: Explicit Mentalizing Without Words in Psychotherapy

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Wiben Jensen ◽  
Stine Steen Høgenhaug ◽  
Morten Kjølbye ◽  
Marie Skaalum Bloch
Keyword(s):  
Interaction Analysis ◽  
Multimodal Interaction ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Video Data ◽  
Verbal Language ◽  
Cognitive Ethnography ◽  
Human Ability ◽  
Gradual Development ◽  
Implicit And Explicit

Introduction: Mentalization concerns the human ability to understand the actions of others (and oneself) in terms of intentional mental states. Theoretically, the notion has been described via the poles of automatic, non-verbal implicit mentalization as opposed to conscious and verbal explicit mentalization. In this article, we challenge this standard distinction by examining examples from psychotherapy. We argue that explicit mentalization can also be carried out via embodied non-verbal actions.Method: Four cases of real-life interaction from psychotherapy sessions are analyzed from the qualitative perspective of embodied cognition and multimodal interaction analysis. The analyses are based on video data transformed into transcriptions and anonymized drawings from a larger cognitive ethnography study conducted at a psychiatric hospital in Denmark.Results: The analyses demonstrate the gradual development from predominantly implicit mentalizing to predominantly explicit mentalizing. In the latter part of the examples, the mentalizing activity is initiated by the therapist on an embodied level but in an enlarged and complex manner indicating a higher level of awareness, imagination, and reflection. Thus, the standard assumption of explicit mentalization as contingent on verbal language is challenged, since it is demonstrated how processes of explicit mentalization can take place on an embodied level without the use of words.Conclusion: Based on real-life data, the study demonstrates that online processes of implicit and explicit mentalization are gradual and interwoven with embodied dynamics in real-life interaction. Thus, the analyses establish a window into how mentalization is carried out by psychotherapists through interaction, which testifies to the importance of embodied non-verbal behavior in psychotherapy. Further, informed by the notion of affordance-space, the study points to alternative ways of conceptualizing the intertwined nature of bodies and environment in relation to conveying more complex understandings of other people.

scholarly journals Implicit and explicit learning of socio-emotional information in a dynamic system control task

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrei Costea ◽  
Răzvan Jurchiș ◽  
Axel Cleeremans ◽  
Laura Visu-Petra ◽  
Adrian Opre ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Real Life ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Explicit Learning ◽  
Emotional Facial Expressions ◽  
Social Situations ◽  
Emotional Information ◽  
Implicit And Explicit ◽  
Implicit And Explicit Learning ◽  
The Way

Unconscious or, implicit learning (IL) is often described as being instrumental to human social functioning. However, most of the available IL tasks have limited external validity; they use surface stimuli that are not socially relevant. Additionally, the way in which participants exchange information within most of the available tasks departs from the way in which information is being exchanged in real-life social situations. In this study, we report the validation of a novel task, inspired from Broadbent et al. (1984), assessing the implicit and explicit learning of socio-emotional information in a dynamic environment. Participants (N=115) interacted with an animated virtual avatar that displayed different levels of emotional facial expressions. Their task was to regulate the avatar’s facial expression to a specified level. Unknown to them, the relationship between their inputs and the avatar’s state was mediated by an abstract rule. Results indicate that learning occurred in the task, as participants gradually increased their ability to bring the avatar in the target state. We found evidence for both explicit (consciously knowing the appropriate response) and implicit (knowing the correct responses even when based on subjectively defined unconscious mental states) knowledge acquisition. This is one of the first studies to propose a task for studying the role of IL in interactive social situations. Implications for future research are discussed.

scholarly journals Perspective influences eye movements during real-life conversation: Mentalising about self vs. others in autism

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mahsa Barzy ◽  
Heather Jane Ferguson ◽  
David Williams
Keyword(s):  
Eye Movements ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Social Background ◽  
Relevant Information ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Social Attention ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
Verbal Responses ◽  
Socially Relevant

Socio-communication is profoundly impaired among autistic individuals. Difficulties representing others’ mental states have been linked to modulations of gaze and speech, which have also been shown to be impaired in autism. Despite these observed impairments in ‘real-world’ communicative settings, research has mostly focused on lab-based experiments, where the language is highly structured. In a pre-registered experiment, we recorded eye movements and verbal responses while adults (N=50) engaged in a real-life conversation. Conversation topic either related to the self, a familiar other, or an unfamiliar other (e.g. "Tell me who is your/your mother’s/Marina’s favourite celebrity and why?”). Results replicated previous work, showing reduced attention to socially-relevant information among autistic participants (i.e. less time looking at the experimenter’s face, and more time looking around the background), compared to typically-developing controls. Importantly, perspective modulated social attention in both groups; talking about an unfamiliar other reduced attention to potentially distracting or resource demanding social information, and increased looks to non-social background. Social attention did not differ between self and familiar other contexts- reflecting greater shared knowledge for familiar/similar others. Autistic participants spent more time looking at the background when talking about an unfamiliar other vs. themselvesFuture research should investigate the cognitive mechanisms underlying this effect.

scholarly journals Organic or organised: an interaction analysis to identify how interactional practices influence participation in group decision meetings for residency selection

BMJ Open ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (12) ◽  
pp. e026424 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lokke Gennissen ◽  
Anne de la Croix ◽  
Karen Stegers-Jager ◽  
Jacqueline de Graaf ◽  
Cornelia R M G Fluit ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Group Decision ◽  
Interaction Analysis ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Turn Taking ◽  
Residency Selection ◽  
Selection Decision ◽  
Resident Selection ◽  
Interactional Patterns

ObjectivesThis study aims to shed light on interactional practices in real-life selection decision-making meetings. Adequate residency selection is crucial, yet currently, we have little understanding of how the decision-making process takes place in practice. Since having a wide range of perspectives on candidates is assumed to enhance decision-making, our analytical focus will lie on the possibilities for committee members to participate by contributing their perspective.DesignWe analysed interaction in seven recorded real-life selection group decision meetings, with explicit attention to participation.SettingSelection meetings of four different highly competitive specialties in two Dutch regions.Participants54 participants discussed 68 candidates.MethodsTo unravel interactional practices, group discussions were analysed using a hybrid data-driven, iterative analytical approach. We paid explicit attention to phenomena which have effects on participation. Word counts and an inductive qualitative analysis were used to identify existing variations in the current practices.ResultsWe found a wide variety of practices. We highlight two distinct interactional patterns, which are illustrative of a spectrum of turn-taking practices, interactional norms and conventions in the meetings. Typical for the first pattern—‘organised’—is a chairperson who is in control of the topic and turn-taking process, silences between turns and a slow topic development. The second pattern—‘organic’—can be recognised by overlapping speech, clearly voiced disagreements and negotiation about the organisation of the discussion. Both interactional patterns influence the availability of information, as they create different types of thresholds for participation.ConclusionsBy deconstructing group decision-making meetings concerning resident selection, we show how structure, interactional norms and conventions affect participation. We identified a spectrum ranging from organic to organised. Both ends have different effects on possibilities for committee members to participate. Awareness of this spectrum might help groups to optimise decision processes by enriching the range of perspectives shared.

scholarly journals Enacting sabotage in siblings’ conflicts: Desired objects and deceptive bodies

Childhood ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 090756822096566
Author(s):  
Emilia Zotevska ◽  
Asta Cekaite ◽  
Ann-Carita Evaldsson
Keyword(s):  
Interaction Analysis ◽  
Multimodal Interaction ◽  
Childhood Studies ◽  
Sibling Conflict ◽  
Considerable Time ◽  
Specific Focus ◽  
Time And Energy

The present study examines sibling’ conflict trajectories with a specific focus on acts of sabotage – deliberate obstruction or destruction of activities with an object. Multimodal interaction analysis is used to understand how siblings’ conflicts are organised through multiple (verbal and embodied) practices. We further draw on childhood studies that focuses on children’s material practices and use the term enactment to better understand human-nonhuman relations. The study found that children put considerable time and energy into configuring deceptive bodies that both organised and disrupted their local moral orders.

scholarly journals From Child-Robot Interaction to Child-Robot-Therapist Interaction: A Case Study in Autism

2012 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-179 ◽  
Author(s):  
I. Giannopulu ◽  
G. Pradel
Keyword(s):  
Social Communication ◽  
Positive Emotion ◽  
Brain Activity ◽  
Multimodal Interaction ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Robot Interaction ◽  
Social And Emotional ◽  
Child Interaction ◽  
Fundamental Part

Troubles in social communication as well as deficits in the cognitive treatment of emotions are supposed to be a fundamental part of autism. We present a case study based on multimodal interaction between a mobile robot and a child with autism in spontaneous, free game play. This case study tells us that the robot mediates the interaction between the autistic child and therapist once the robot-child interaction has been established. In addition, the child uses the robot as a mediator to express positive emotion playing with the therapist. It is thought that the three-pronged interaction i.e., child-robot-therapist could better facilitate the transfer of social and emotional abilities to real life settings. Robot therapy has a high potential to improve the condition of brain activity in autistic children.

Analysing the Construction of Modal Configurations with Mediating Digital Texts in the Classroom

2015 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Jonathon Adams
Keyword(s):  
Interaction Analysis ◽  
Multimodal Interaction ◽  
Communicative Practices ◽  
Digital Texts

AbstractWith digital texts being employed in classrooms, the construction and content of communication need to be examined to understand implications for classroom pedagogies and the development of new communicative practices. The study employs a multimodal interaction analysis (MIA) framework (

scholarly journals The Hard Limits of Decoding Mental States: The Decodability of fMRI

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Jabakhanji ◽  
A.D. Vigotsky ◽  
J. Bielefeld ◽  
L. Huang ◽  
M.N. Baliki ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Brain Activity ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Discrimination Performance ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Compelling Evidence ◽  
Fine Grained ◽  
High Profile ◽  
Life Decision

SUMMARYHigh-profile studies claim to assess mental states across individuals using multi-voxel decoders of brain activity. The fixed, fine-grained, multi-voxel patterns in these “optimized” decoders are purportedly necessary for discriminating between, and accurately identifying, mental states. Here, we present compelling evidence that the efficacy of these decoders is overstated. Across a variety of tasks, decoder patterns were not necessary. Not only were “optimized decoders” spatially imprecise and 90% redundant, but they also performed similarly to simpler decoders, built from average brain activity. We distinguish decoder performance when used for discriminating between, in contrast to identifying, mental states, and show even when discrimination performance is strong, identification can be poor. Using similarity rules, we derived novel and intuitive discriminability metrics that capture 95% and 68% of discrimination performance within- and across-subjects, respectively. These findings demonstrate that current across-subject decoders remain inadequate for real-life decision making.

scholarly journals Theory of Mind Increases Aesthetic Appreciation in Visual Arts

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Marina Iosifyan
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Cognitive Ability ◽  
Causal Relationship ◽  
Visual Arts ◽  
Emotional State ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Aesthetic Appreciation ◽  
Aesthetic Cognition ◽  
Mental Characteristics

Abstract Theory of mind is a cognitive ability that enables us to understand mental states of others, important in real-life communications as well as in aesthetic cognition. The present research investigated whether understanding intentions and emotions is related to aesthetic appreciation. Study 1 tested whether there is a link between aesthetic appreciation of cinematic films and attempts to understand the intentions and emotions of the artists and the film characters. It showed that a self-reported understanding of emotions and intentions is positively associated with aesthetic appreciation. Studies 2 and 4 investigated a causal relationship between the attempt to understand emotions and an aesthetic appreciation of artistic photos. Study 3 investigated an actual understanding of emotions and aesthetic appreciation of movie shots. The results show that when people evaluate the emotional state of the characters, they aesthetically appreciate artistic photos more, compared to when they evaluate non-mental characteristics of these photos (age of the characters, the colour of the photos). Moreover, better understanding of another’s emotions is related to greater aesthetic appreciation.

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