Young Children’s Theory of Mind: Home Literacy Environment, Technology Usage, and Preschool Education

Dilek Altun

doi:10.11114/jets.v7i3.4057

Abstract

Theory of mind (ToM) skills involve young children’s mentalizing ability to be aware of their own selves and other individuals’ thoughts, beliefs, desires, and intentions (mental states). The social cognition skills are essential for processing complex social relations and overcoming interpersonal difficulties in communication. Previous studies shed light on the relationship of parenting and demographics to children’s ToM skills, but do not examine the associations with both home environment and preschool education experiences. The goal of the present study is to investigate children’s preschool education experience, home literacy environment (HLE), and technology usage in relation to their ToM skills. Participants were 203 preschoolers and their parents. The study data were collected using a home literacy environment questionnaire (HLEQ), theory of mind scale, and a demographic information form. The findings revealed that (a) children’s ToM scores are not differentiated regarding gender, excluding the diverse belief tasks, b) children’s ToM performances were differentiated in favor of children who have internet access at home, c) HLE, child age, daily TV watching, household income, maternal education, preschool experience, and shared book reading explained 46% of the total variance of preschoolers’ ToM scores.

Highlights

Theory of mind (ToM) skills involve young children‘s mentalizing ability to be aware of their own selves and other individuals‘ thoughts, beliefs, desires, and intentions that both differentiate the self and other perspectives processing simultaneously (Schneider, Slaughter, & Dux, 2015; Tager-Flusberg, 2007) and attribute to others mental states to anticipate and assert behavior based on those states (Premarck & Woodruff, 1978; Leslie, 1987; Wellman & Liu, 2004)
The study‘s findings revealed that children‘s age is moderately related (r = 0.49) to their ToM skills
The developmental order in ToM skills acquisition has been addressed in previous studies (Hughes et al, 2011; Jenkins & Astington, 1996; Miller, 2009; Wellman et al, 2001)

Summary

Introduction

Theory of mind (ToM) skills involve young children‘s mentalizing ability to be aware of their own selves and other individuals‘ thoughts, beliefs, desires, and intentions (mental states) that both differentiate the self and other perspectives processing simultaneously (Schneider, Slaughter, & Dux, 2015; Tager-Flusberg, 2007) and attribute to others mental states to anticipate and assert behavior based on those states (Premarck & Woodruff, 1978; Leslie, 1987; Wellman & Liu, 2004). Research has shown that ToM skills are acquired during early childhood in normally developing children (Wellman, Cross, & Watson, 2001; Wimmer & Perner, 1983); children‘s pervasive developmental disorders, especially Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD), showed lower performance among these tasks (Biçer & Sarı, 2017; Leppanen, Sedgewick, Treasure, & Tchanturia, 2018; Özen, 2011; Peterson, Slaughter, Moore, & Wellman, 2016; Volkmar, Lord, Bailey, Schultz, & Klin, 2004). The majority of children who are roughly three years old (80%) fail to pass false-belief tasks and roughly half of the developmentally shifting four-year-old children pass the task (Wellman et al, 2001)

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Conclusion