Second-order Theory Of Mind Tasks Research Articles

Understanding internal and external shame in childhood: the role of theory of mind

ABSTRACTShame can be either internal or external. The former type of shame is associated with what one thinks and feels about one’s self, the latter is linked with what one believes that others think about the self. This study aimed to (a) compare children’s ability to understand these two types of shame and (b) test the hypothesis that only external shame attribution is linked to children’s ability to understand second-order beliefs. Four- to 6-year-old children (N = 93) were presented with a task assessing their ability to attribute internal and external shame to story protagonists. Children were also tested on a battery of first-order and second-order theory of mind tasks. The results provide evidence for a parallel age-related increase in children’s understanding of the two types of shame. In line with our hypothesis, only external, but not internal, shame attribution was associated with children’s ability to understand others’ second-order beliefs.

学龄前儿童分配模式的传递效应：心理理论和共情的作用 <sup>*</sup>

<p id="C2">Previous studies found that children would reciprocate those having benefited them previously, a behavior termed direct reciprocity. When there was no opportunity to reciprocate, the recipient would pay it forward to a third one. The current study aimed to find whether preschoolers would pay it forward if their absolute gains would be dependent on their allocations and its potential socio-cognitive mechanisms. We hypothesized that preschoolers would pay forward others’ selfish, fair or generous allocations, but this tendency would be stronger in the selfish and fair conditions; theory of mind (ToM) as well as empathy would play a role in it.<br/>Children aged 4 to 6 (<italic>N</italic> = 118, 63 females; <italic>M</italic>_age = 64.25 months, <italic>SD</italic> = 6.76) were randomly assigned into 3 experimental groups and 1 control group. In the experimental groups, each child was firstly asked to help an anonymous partner complete a jigsaw game (the child and the partner were to make equal contributions in the game), and then was allocated a reward of 1 token (selfish), 3 tokens (fair) or 5 tokens (generous) as the partner proposed (allocating a total of 6 tokens); subsequently, each participant completed another jigsaw game with another anonymous recipient, to whom the participant then acted as an allocator. In contrast, participants in the control group only completed the resource allocation task once as an allocator after cooperating with an anonymous partner in the jigsaw game. Participants’ abilities of ToM were measured with first-order and second-order ToM tasks. Their abilities of empathy were assessed with the Griffith Empathy Measurement (GEM), filled by their teacher-in-charge. <br/>We found that preschoolers would pay the selfish allocations forward, and even generous ones in spite that their absolute self-interests were dependent on their decisions. Specifically, compared with children in the control group, children in the selfish or generous groups were more likely to propose a similar pattern of allocation for the anonymous recipient, which indicated that others’ patterns of allocation exerted influence on children’s decisions. In contrast, there was no significant difference between the proportion of fair allocations in the control group (80%) and the fair group (80%). Moreover, children in the generous-allocation group who paid it forward had higher levels of second-order ToM and (cognitive) empathy than those who did not do so. However, there were no such differences between these two types of participants in the selfish-allocation and fair-allocation groups.<br/>It was suggested that preschoolers were sensitive to the patterns of allocations made by others, and they would pay it forward whether the allocations were advantageous or disadvantageous to themselves. Socio-cognitive abilities (e.g., ToM, empathy) could be important explanatory factors for this pay-forward effect. Besides, preschoolers in a collaborative context were more likely to comply with the norm of equity. Future studies might test other moderators, such as group membership of the partner, the way children acquire the resources, and explore other explanatory factors like executive functions.

A novel task for examining the neural basis of Theory of Mind deficits in bipolar disorder

Deficits in theory of mind (ToM) processing have been observed in people with bipolar disorder (BD), but the neural basis of these deficits remains unclear. Here, we studied the relations between neural activation, dysfunctional beliefs and behavioral responses in people with BD during a second-order ToM task. Twenty-five patients and 25 healthy-control participants (HC) underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) while performing a novel ToM task. The Dysfunctional Attitudes scale (DAS) and the Brief Hypomanic Attitudes and Positive Predictions Inventory (BHAPPI) were used to assess dysfunctional beliefs. Significant differences in neural activation were observed between HC and BD patients in regions associated with ToM processing: medial frontal, cingulate, anterior cingulate and superior temporal gyri. Correlations between DAS scores and neural activity in medial frontal and cingulate gyri were observed for HC only. Increased activation in brain regions associated with ToM processing in patients compared to HC provides further evidence of disruption in networks controlling social-cognitive processes. Whether this results from compensatory responses to maintain appropriate behavior is unknown.

Social-moral awareness and theory of mind in adult offenders who have intellectual disabilities

PurposeThere has been little empirical investigation into the theoretical relationship between moral reasoning and offending in people with intellectual disabilities (ID). The purpose of this paper is to compare offending and non-offending ID groups on a new measure of social-moral awareness, and on theory of mind (ToM).Design/methodology/approachA between groups design was used. The scores of 21 male offenders and 21 male non-offenders, all with ID and matched for IQ, were compared on the Social-Moral Awareness Test (SMAT) and on two ToM tasks.FindingsThere was no significant difference in SMAT scores or on first- or second-order ToM tasks between offending and non-offending groups. Better ToM performance significantly predicted higher SMAT scores and non-offending groups. Better ToM performance significantly predicted higher SMAT scores.Research limitations/implicationsResults were inconsistent with previous research. Further work is required to establish the validity and theoretical underpinnings of the SMAT. Development in the measurement of ToM for people with ID is also required.Originality/valueThis is the first use of the SMAT with a population of offenders who have ID. The findings suggest caution in its use in clinical settings.

Impaired Interpretation of Others' Behavior is Associated with Difficulties in Recognizing Pragmatic Language in Patients with Schizophrenia.

Much attention has been paid to the pragmatic language function in schizophrenia. This study of Japanese patients with schizophrenia examined the relationship between impaired interpretation of the behaviors of other people in social contexts and the ability to recognize metaphor and irony. We assessed 34patients with schizophrenia and 34 normal subjects using first- and second-order theory of mind tasks, the Metaphor and Sarcasm Scenario Test, and the Dewey Story Test (which tests the ability to judge others' social behaviors). We compared the performance between the groups and analyzed correlations between the tasks. All tasks revealed significant deficits in the patients compared with the controls. In the patient group, metaphor comprehension was correlated with the ability to judge normal behaviors, and irony comprehension was correlated with the ability to judge abnormal behaviors, suggesting that deficits of social cognition in schizophrenia include these two types of factors associated with pragmatic language.

Object Clitic production in monolingual and bilingual children with Specific Language Impairment

Abstract Pronominal clitics are sensitive to both morphosyntax and discourse. Problems in clitic use could therefore stem from morphosyntactic or discourse management problems in children with SLI. Previous studies focused on 3rd person clitic use identifying morphosyntactic problems. We compare 1st with 3rd person clitic elicitation by monolingual and bilingual children with SLI to examine whether perspective-switching in the same task would affect performance. Elicited 3rd person clitics were further compared with clitic use in narratives to investigate the role of richer discourse context in clitic production. Perspective-taking was independently examined with first- and second-order Theory of Mind tasks. Bilingual were more accurate than monolingual children with SLI in 1st person clitics, in the use of unambiguous clitics in narratives and in second-order ToM reasoning. We conclude that bilingualism seems to enhance SLI children’s discourse use and perspective-taking strategies which, in turn, improve their use of clitics in context-sensitive conditions.

Theory of mind in recognizing and recovering communicative failures

ABSTRACTWe analyzed the role played by theory of mind (ToM) in children's ability to recognize and repair different kinds of communicative failures. In particular, we analyzed three different kinds of communicative failures: failure of the expression act, communicative meaning, and communicative effect. We administered videotaped stories, in which people act out a communicative failure and first- and second-order ToM tasks, to 120 children ranging in age from 3.5 to 8.5 years. The children showed a trend of increasing difficulty in managing the communicative failures investigated. Moreover, children's ToM ability is partially correlated with recognition and repair of a communicative task; however, it is not able to explain the trend of difficulty we detected. We suggest that the factor better explaining such trend is the increasing complexity of the mental representations underlying the three different kinds of failures.

10.5937/specedreh13-5428 = Theory of mind acquisition in children and adolescents with mild intellectual disability

Theory of mind is the ability to attribute mental states (such as beliefs, desires, intentions and emotions) to self and others, in order to predict and explain observable behavior. The development of these abilities, which are essential for successful social interactions, social responsiveness and harmonious relations in everyday life, is delayed in persons with intellectual disabilities. The objective of this research was to determine the attainment of the theory of mind in school-age children with mild intellectual disability, using first order and second order false-belief tasks, as well as the relationships between theory of mind and age, sex, intellectual level and bilingualism. The acquisition of first and second order theory of mind was estimated on a sample of 120 children and adolescents with mild intellectual disability, aged 8 to 16, using Sally-Anne unexpected transfer test (Baron- Cohen, Leslie, Frith, 1985). More than two thirds (68%) of the participants were successful on the first-order theory of mind task, while 48% of them passed secondorder theory of mind task. The acquisition of the theory of mind follows normal course of development. The Chi square test revealed that there were no significant effects of sex, intellectual level and bilingualism on performances on either the first or second order theory of mind tasks. On the contrary, significant differences between studied groups were found with regard to certain indicators of their socioeconomic status.

Mindful storytellers: Emerging pragmatics and theory of mind development

Emerging pragmatic language skills involve social, cognitive and linguistic abilities, including children’s awareness of the conversational partner’s mental states. The present study investigated the relation between children’s theory of mind (ToM) and features of pragmatic language skills assessed through narrative discourse. One hundred and fifteen Spanish-speaking children attending preschool and first grade (57 girls, 58 boys) participated. Children completed a standardized measure of receptive language, narrated a wordless picture book and completed first- and second-order ToM tasks. ToM was significantly related to various pragmatic language features. Hierarchical regression analyses showed that second-order ToM scores were a significant predictor of pragmatic language skills. Findings suggest that children’s communicative competence in social contexts, to some extent, requires the development of higher-order social-cognitive reasoning.

Mindreading abilities in sexual offenders: An analysis of theory of mind processes

The paper aims to assess the theory of mind (ToM) of sexual offenders. We administered to 21 sexual offenders and to 21 nonoffenders two classical first- and second-order ToM tasks, a selection of six Strange Stories, and a semi-structured interview, the Theory of Mind Assessment Scale (Th.o.m.a.s), which provides a multi-dimensional evaluation of ToM, investigating first- vs. third-person and egocentric vs. allocentric perspectives. Results show that sexual offenders performed worse than controls on second-order ToM tasks, on Strange Stories and on each of the Th.o.m.a.s dimensions, whereas they did as well as the control group on first-order ToM tasks. A detailed analysis of participants' performance on Th.o.m.a.s. showed that sex offenders performed worse on the third-person than on the first-person ToM scale, and worse on the allocentric than on the egocentric perspective; these findings did not apply to the controls. Implications for future research and treatment are discussed.

Impaired theory of mind performance in patients with recurrent bipolar disorder: Moderating effect of cognitive load

The aim of this study was to investigate theory of mind (ToM) performance on tasks that varied in the demands they placed on cognitive processing resources in a sample of 14 bipolar patients with subsyndromal illness and 14 controls. Patients showed impaired performance on cognitively demanding second-order ToM tasks. Reduced ToM performance was associated with longer illness duration, and with increased symptom severity.

Suicidality Connected with Mentalizing Anomalies in Schizophrenia

Deficits in social cognition contribute to the severe difficulties in daily functioning of schizophrenic patients, although they have never been connected with suicidality. Theory of mind (ToM) tasks explore basic social abilities and have been found to be defective in schizophrenia. The relationship between ToM anomalies and suicidal history was studied in a sample of 57 stabilized outpatients. Logistic regression analysis showed an association between poor performance on second-order ToM tasks and a greater likelihood of suicidality in schizophrenic patients (OR = 4.02, 95% CI 1.18-13.62), which was independent of current clinical and neuropsychological status, with the exception of poor premorbid adjustment in infancy and adolescence. We caution against potential biases from mixing cross-sectional ToM scores with lifetime suicidal records and retrospective assessments of premorbid adjustment through repeated testing of patients and their relatives. Hence, the present findings suggest that ToM deficits may contribute to the high risk of suicide in schizophrenia.

Neuropsychological Evidence of Impaired Cognitive Empathy in Euthymic Bipolar Disorder

The empathic abilities have never been examined in bipolar disorder patients, despite frequent observations of impaired social behavior. To examine the neuropsychological processes that underlie the affective and cognitive empathic ability in bipolar disorder, the authors compared affective and cognitive empathic abilities, as well as theory of mind and executive functions, of euthymic bipolar disorder patients and healthy comparison subjects. Significant deficits in cognitive empathy and theory of mind were observed, while affective empathy was elevated in bipolar disorder. Patients showed impaired cognitive flexibility (shifting and reversal learning) but intact planning behavior. Impaired cognitive empathy was related with performance in neurocognitive tasks of cognitive flexibility, suggesting that prefrontal cortical dysfunction may account for impaired cognitive empathy in bipolar disorder.

Poor Premorbid Adjustment and Dysfunctional Executive Abilities Predict Theory of Mind Deficits in Stabilized Schizophrenic Outpatients

Deficits in Theory of Mind (ToM) have been demonstrated in schizophrenia. The present study explored the relationship between ToM deficits, poor premorbid adjustment, and executive dysfunction in a sample of fifty-eight stabilized schizophrenic outpatients in contrast to a normative control group. Ordinal regression analysis revealed an association between deficits in both first- and second-order ToM tasks and poor social premorbid adjustment. In addition, deficits in first-order tasks showed an association with a low performance on the Trail Making Test B, while deficits in second-order tasks were related to male gender, a low performance on Block Design, and clozapine treatment. The R-square values amounted to 0.300 and 0.657, respectively. Years of illness evolution, the symptoms on the PANSS scale and Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV) diagnostic subtype were not significantly associated with first- or second-order ToM tasks. Results of this study define a h...

Ajuste premórbido pobre vinculado al deterioro en habilidades de teoría de la mente: estudio en pacientes esquizofrénicos estabilizados

Previous studies suggest that there is a deficit in theory of mind (ToM) in stabilised schizophrenic patients. More specifically, it has been claimed that poor premorbid adjustment covaries with the abnormalities in ToM skills detected in such patients. It has also been suggested that this deficit could be a trait marker for schizophrenic disorders. The aim of this study was to examine the performance in mentalistic skills in 36 stabilised schizophrenic patients in comparison to a standard control group. We also sought to examine the relation between ToM skills and premorbid adjustment in our target sample. Premorbid adjustment was evaluated using the modified Cannon-Spoor premorbid adjustment scale, and ToM measurements were obtained by means of first- and second-order verbal experimental tasks. Schizophrenic patients presented statistically significant poorer performances in first- and second-order ToM tasks, although no differences were observed between these patients and the control sample as regards overall cognitive acuity. Poor premorbid adjustment in areas of social functioning in the patients was also associated with statistically significant poorer performance in both ToM tasks. Deficient premorbid adjustment in schizophrenia may be linked to a ToM deficit that can be assessed with simple tasks.

Comprehension of metaphor and irony in schizophrenia during remission: The role of theory of mind and IQ

The study reported herein explored the comprehension of metaphor and irony in schizophrenia during remission, and examined the role of IQ and a theory of mind. Performance of 29 Schizophrenic patients in remission and 22 healthy controls was compared on metaphor and irony comprehension tasks and first- and second-order theory of mind tasks. Participants' IQs were measured using the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised, and the symptoms of individuals with schizophrenia were assessed using the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale. The results showed that patients with schizophrenia were impaired in their comprehension of metaphor and irony as compared with healthy controls. A theory of mind deficit was found in patients with remitted schizophrenia. The comprehension of metaphor was significantly correlated with second-order false belief understanding and the comprehension of irony was not significantly related to theory of mind. IQ and verbal IQ did not explain the deficit of metaphor and irony comprehension. These findings were not explained by Happé's [Happé, F.G.E., 1993. Communication competence and theory of mind in autism: a test of relevance theory. Cognition 48, 101–119] theory and the shared semantic understanding requirement was discussed.

Theory of mind after traumatic brain injury

This study investigated whether people with severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) demonstrate a specific impairment on tasks requiring them to make inferences about others’ mental states (theory of mind tasks). Participants with severe TBI were compared to a healthy group on verbal first-order and second-order theory of mind (ToM) tasks, non-verbal ToM tasks and on verbal and non-verbal tasks requiring them to make general (non-mental) inferences (NMIs). The clinical group performed more poorly than controls on both ToM and NMI tasks. This performance was not completely accounted for by the working memory or implicit language demands of the tasks. Multiple regression analyses suggested that patients with TBI have a general weakness in inference-making that, combined with linguistic and working memory limitations, impairs their performance on both non-verbal and second-order ToM tasks. However, a specific ToM impairment may underlie their poor performance on verbal first-order tasks. Implications of this finding for the possibility of a separate cognitive module of ToM are discussed, as well as for the rehabilitation of social deficits after TBI.

Verbal Memory and Performance IQ Predict Theory of Mind and Emotion Recognition Ability in Children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders and in Psychiatric Control Children

This study was designed to examine the developmental and cognitive correlates of theory of mind (ToM) and emotion recognition ability in children with autism (N = 20), with pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS) (N = 20), and in psychiatric control children (N = 20). The diagnostic groups were person-to-person matched on age and verbal IQ. The age of the children was between 8 and 18 years; their Full Scale IQ was at least 65. The test battery included tasks for the matching and the context recognition of emotional expressions, and a set of first- and second-order ToM tasks. The relationships between composite domain scores and the subjects' age, Verbal IQ, Performance IQ, verbal memory, visual memory, and gender were examined in bivariate and multivariate analyses. Further, the subjects who reliably and consistently passed the tasks of a domain and those who could not were compared on developmental and cognitive characteristics. Overall, the results of the various analyses converged and indicated that verbal memory, Performance IQ, age and gender were the best predictors of social cognitive ability.

Verbal Memory and Performance IQ Predict Theory of Mind and Emotion Recognition Ability in Children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders and in Psychiatric Control Children

This study was designed to examine the developmental and cognitive correlates of theory of mind (ToM) and emotion recognition ability in children with autism (N= 20), with pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS) (N= 20), and in psychiatric control children (N= 20). The diagnostic groups were person-to-person matched on age and verbal IQ. The age of the children was between 8 and 18 years; their Full Scale IQ was at least 65. The test battery included tasks for the matching and the context recognition of emotional expressions, and a set of first- and second-order ToM tasks. The relationships between composite domain scores and the subjects' age, Verbal IQ, Performance IQ, verbal memory, visual memory, and gender were examined in bivariate and multivariate analyses. Further, the subjects who reliably and consistently passed the tasks of a domain and those who could not were compared on developmental and cognitive characteristics. Overall, the results of the various analyses converged and indicated that verbal memory, Performance IQ, age and gender were the best predictors of social cognitive ability.

Theory of mind and emotion-recognition functioning in autistic spectrum disorders and in psychiatric control and normal children.

The hypothesis was tested that weak theory of mind (ToM) and/or emotion recognition (ER) abilities are specific to subjects with autism. Differences in ToM and ER performance were examined between autistic (n = 20), pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS) (n = 20), psychiatric control (n = 20), and normal children (n = 20). The clinical groups were matched person-to-person on age and verbal IQ. We used tasks for the matching and the context recognition of emotional expressions, and a set of first- and second-order ToM tasks. Autistic and PDD-NOS children could not be significantly differentiated from each other, nor could they be differentiated from the psychiatric controls with a diagnosis of ADHD (n = 9). The psychiatric controls with conduct disorder or dysthymia performed about as well as normal children. The variance in second-order ToM performance contributed most to differences between diagnostic groups.