The effect of humour on children's developing theory of mind

Abstract

The understanding of false belief in 3–5‐year‐old children was investigated using a false‐belief situation involving humour and characters playfully interacting with one another. The situation also allowed the child to see that one character did not have sufficient information to allow him or her to act correctly and to see the completed action based on that false belief. Children's understanding of belief in humourous false‐belief task was compared to their understanding ascertained by a standard false‐belief task. When compared to their performance on a standard false‐belief task, older children did more often identify the false belief in the humourous situation but younger children had more difficulty with the humourous false‐belief tasks. These findings are discussed in terms of the relation between social context as seen in the humourous situation and the emerging understanding of mental states such as beliefs.