Perspective‐shifting discourse training to improve young Japanese children's understanding of theory of mind

Abstract

AbstractThe development of a mind‐reading ability, known as theory‐of‐mind (ToM), has been recognized as following a universal process, but the age at which the false‐belief task is passed has been reported to have wide inter‐group variabilities. Japanese children have been reported to acquire a false‐belief understanding at a slightly older age than their western counterparts. The present study investigated the extent to which Japanese‐children's understanding of ToM could be brought forward by using perspective‐shifting training in conversational discourses. Japanese children aged 4.5 years‐old, but not 4.0 years‐old, improved their false‐belief understanding after the training. However, this improvement was limited to their understanding of representation‐change. Although it is hard to isolate the influence of language experiences and socio‐culture aspects, training with perspective‐shifting discourses in interactive contexts was effective in enhancing the development of mind‐reading for 4.5 year old Japanese children.HighlightsThis study investigated the benefits of perspective‐shifting training in conversational discourses for Japanese‐children's theory‐of‐mind (ToM) understanding.Japanese children aged 4.5 years‐old, but not 4.0 years‐old, improved their false‐belief understanding after the training.Perspective‐shifting discourse training lowers the age at which Japanese children can understand ToM.