Interpreting the results of explicit and applied theory of mind collectively in autistic children: A solution from Rasch analysis.

Abstract

Theory of mind is an ability to infer others' mental states, which is a foundation for generating appropriate social responses. Theory of mind can be conceptually divided into two related but distinguishable constructs: explicit theory of mind (conceptual knowledge/information about others' mental states) and applied theory of mind (the ability to use theory of mind skills in real-life contexts). Although these two theory of mind scores can be described by the percentages of children in the early, basic, and advanced developmental stages, the resulting information may not be sufficient to determine the corresponding relationships between these two theory of mind constructs or identify children with mismatched theory of mind abilities (e.g. children who have difficulty in effectively applying their theory of mind knowledge in real-life contexts). To resolve these limitations, methods for simultaneously interpreting the relationships between the two theory of mind scores are proposed. Based on the findings, each applied theory of mind score can reflect multiple scores of explicit theory of mind. In particular, the results do not take measurement error into consideration, which would make them more ambiguous. Therefore, the scores of applied theory of mind should be interpreted carefully, given that children who have the same applied theory of mind score may actually have high or low explicit theory of mind. Regarding the method for joint interpretation, cutoff scores were selected to identify children who have mismatched theory of mind abilities (high explicit theory of mind with low applied theory of mind or low explicit theory of mind with high applied theory of mind) and determine the priority for interventions.